The California Supreme Court will issue its ruling on Monday, July 2 at 10:00 a.m. in a five-year old case that is critical to issues of local government authority and the ability of construction unions to use the state government to set and mandate wage rates (“prevailing wages”) for construction workers on public works projects. The case is State Building and Construction Trades Council v. City of Vista.
If you want electronic notification from the California Supreme Court on Monday when it publishes the decision, go to this web site and fill out the form.
There are 121 charter cities in California, including the latest approved by voters on June 5 (City of El Cajon). Many of them set their own policies concerning government-mandated construction wage rates on municipal construction projects. (Most of those cities exempt their local projects from state-mandated construction wage rate laws.) See the only authoritive guide to the prevailing wage status of charter cities here:
http://abc-ccc.org/documents/CharterCityReportFINAL.pdf
(Note: the guide does not include El Cajon as the latest charter city, and Irvine repealed its exemption in April 2011 on a 3-2 vote of the city council.)
Want more information about this case and the practical implications of this case on California cities? My most recent articles on California’s state-mandated construction wage rate laws (prevailing wage laws) are found here:
Exclusive: Local Government Election Results in California Highly Relevant to Labor Issues