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Following the June passing of Alabama’s new illegal immigration law, HB56, many Hispanics have left the state to seek work elsewhere, causing a potential shortage of construction...
Reshaping the Construction Industry
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The first investigative report by David Schecter at WFAA in Dallas/Fort Worth drew quick reaction from other subcontractors and from legislators in Austin. In a follow up...
July 17, 2011
WFAA News 8 TV in Dallas/Fort Worth aired an investigative report last night by David Schecter about the plight of worker misclassification in the Texas construction industry, and...
July 13, 2011
The Career Advisory Board and DeVry University recently teamed with the folks at Harris Interactive to do a poll on “The Millennials”, identified as adults ages 21-31, and report on their current expectations for the future of their careers in the workforce.I found it interesting that the survey was “conducted online within the United States between December 29, 2010 and January 10, 2011.” According to the report Future Of Millennial Careers:“The survey participants included 500 U.S. adults age 21-31 who are either employed or plan to seek employment in the future. They also included 523 U.S. adults age 18+ who are
July 12, 2011
Home builder and general contractor Reynaldo Orozco has been sentenced to 18 months in prison and ordered to repay $504,047 in unpaid employment tax for filing a false tax return for his Miami business, Rock Construction Builders Inc.According to a press release from the United States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida, court documents state that from 2004 through 2007, Orozco issued corporate checks from his business to nonexistent subcontractors, then cashed those checks himself at local check cashing stores to generate large amounts of cash which he then used to pay his employees without reporting those wages on quarterly employment tax returns and without withholding taxes
July 11, 2011
The Associated General Contractors of America (AGC) have issued a plea for action against the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed revision to their Construction General...
July 07, 2011
Our last blog post talked about “black box” projects. ExxonMobil just disclosed a new project that has been in the Black Box for several years: Project Delta. ...
July 06, 2011
Corporations and government agencies have fairly large “Black Boxes” like the infamous “Area 59” in California where they conduct research, development and design on projects that they don’t want their competition or sometimes their vendors and allies to know about.In the economic development world, it is not unusual for a city’s economic development team to be contacted by a site consultant or company representative to discuss potential sites for an unnamed project. Invariably they have great names like Dick and Jane or the Duck, or more recently the Delta project.The mystery companies make everyone sign non-disclosure agreements or NDAs to keep the real company’s identity secret during negotiations.
July 05, 2011
The objective of most employees is earning a living doing what you enjoy doing. The objective of most businesses is building a competent and professional workforce able to respond to customer’s needs. AND, the objective of all concerned is the steady flow of work and manpower.Since most jobs these days have evolved into areas of specialty, the narrowly trained professional will do well when his or her expertise is needed, but might find oneself on the sideline or sent home if unable to contribute. So, to keep things on track for all concerned, the best scenario would be to have everyone trained in all phases of the work. Reality shows this is impossible, but we can do what it takes to approach this goal by cross training.We all want to improve ourselves and advance in life. A company that doesn’t keep training ongoing will find their people moving on down the road to another job that will allow them to advance. Allowing employees trained in one area to
June 30, 2011
Last March, Construction Citizen covered a protest held by workers who had been cheated out of wages by Carole Johnson Builders LLC, a subcontractor on a Houston construction project. We were able to interview of one of the foreman who had worked for the subcontractor on the project and who had not been able to collect the wages he was owed.Bobby Herndon worked for Carole Johnson Builders LLC and was told that he would be paid wages by the hour. He was not paid overtime for the hours he worked each week over 40, and in fact the Carole Johnson Builders LLC did not even pay for all of the hours Herndon worked. When asked how much money he was still owed of the money he had earned, the pain and hurt from the injustice is evident in the following video as he answers “twenty-four hundred dollars.”
June 29, 2011
