Project Labor Agreement Mandates: The Ongoing Saga

For several decades, federal contractors have monitored the ebbing-and-flowing status of project labor agreements (PLAs). A PLA is a pre-hire collective bargaining agreement, specifically authorized under federal labor law, establishing the terms and conditions of employment for a specific project or group of projects. It serves essentially as a project constitution, establishing uniform work rules among the numerous trades on major construction projects and banning work stoppages.

For over 30 years, numerous executive orders (EO) pertaining to PLAs have been issued. Since PLAs are a vehicle favorable to organized labor, the approach to them has understandably varied with the political orientation of respective presidential administrations from George H. W. Bush through Donald Trump’s first term.

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