Union targets local job site

The state's biggest labor union is taking on one of the city's largest contractors as part of its effort to organize the home-building industry.

Pete King Nevada Corp., a painting and drywall subcontractor with about 400 local workers, is the latest in a series of regional construction businesses picketed as part of the AFL-CIO's Building Justice initiative, a campaign to unionize residential building in the Southwest United States.

An affiliate group of the AFL-CIO organized a picket line of more than 100 construction workers outside the Mira Villa condominium development in Summerlin on Wednesday to protest what it said were unsafe working conditions at Pete King Nevada, which is performing work at the community.

In addition to picketing the job site, the AFL-CIO's District Council 15 Painters and Allied Trades Union released a statement accusing Pete King Nevada of skipping out on overtime pay and failing to correct hazardous job-site conditions. The union's statement also noted that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has cited Pete King Nevada for numerous violations, such as failing to provide respiratory-protection equipment and adequate safety training.

What's even worse, the union said, is that Pete King Nevada's president, Bruce King, serves on the Nevada State Contractors Board, an agency charged with promoting health, welfare and safety through a builders' licensing system. Then-Gov. Kenny Guinn appointed King to the board in 2005.

"It's a real problem to have someone who is on the contractors board violating the law, if you understand that it's the board's job to discipline contractors who don't meet the standards contractors are supposed to meet," said Danny Thompson, executive secretary and treasurer of the AFL-CIO's Nevada chapter.

But Bruce King, president of Pete King Nevada, said it was "grossly unfair" to link his company's OSHA record with his service on the contractors board.

"I don't think there's any contractor of any size that has not been written up by OSHA," King said. "Any company that's been in the business for any time, I would imagine we all have been written up by OSHA for one thing or another."

King said Pete King Nevada regularly has visits from OSHA, and his safety director has been through OSHA training. Every worker is supplied with gloves, respiratory devices, ladders and OSHA-approved electrical cords, he said.

King believes the union is more interested in organizing workers at Pete King Nevada than it is in worker safety, and he thinks the union has targeted his company because of its large volume of business and its high employee count.

Records at the Occupational Safety and Health Administration show 18 safety violations at Pete King Nevada between November 2002 and November 2007. Fines against the contractor ranged from $1,125 to $9,200, and totaled $32,500 in the five-year period.

OSHA characterized all but one of the violations as serious, which is the lowest grade of severity. The remaining breach qualified as a repeat problem, which ranks in the middle of OSHA's three levels of infractions. Pete King Nevada wasn't cited in the most-grave category, willful violation.

The last OSHA investigation into the company was Nov. 15, 2006.

OSHA's top local official, Stephen Coffield, didn't return a call seeking comment on whether the agency's investigations into and findings on Pete King Nevada's safety record were more significant than average.

Diane Cravotta, president of Henderson safety consultant Compliance Science, said it's difficult to pinpoint a normal rate of violations and fines for a company over five years. But she added that the number of violations at Pete King Nevada sounds "a little high."

"(The $32,550 in fines) is not a big concern, but it's something to watch," she said.

Representatives of the Nevada State Contractors Board declined to comment on Pete King Nevada's OSHA record.

Pete King Nevada isn't the only OSHA-fined company with representatives on the board.

J & J Mechanical, a nonunion Reno company that performs plumbing, heating and air-conditioning work in schools and public buildings, posted seven OSHA violations and fines of $1,500 between November 2002 and November 2007. Wells Cargo of Reno, a 700-worker, unionized manufacturer of truck trailers, also had seven citations between 2002 and 2007, with $10,750 in fines levied. And Tanamera Commercial Development, a nonunion company in Reno that emphasizes master-plans, high-end residential and commercial space, received three violations from OSHA in the preceding five years. The business, which has about 50 employees, fielded $2,375 in assessments.

Asked whether the AFL-CIO would also protest working conditions among other contractors on the board, Thompson said, "That very well may happen." But he circled the conversation back to Pete King Nevada, explaining that breaking wage laws was just as important a matter.

"OSHA violations may or may not happen to anybody, but cheating people out of money is a big problem," Thompson said.

OSHA files don't show activity in the past five years involving other companies with executives on the contractors board. The federal agency has taken no action against Filios Construction, Unique Landscaping, R/S Development Co. and Diamond Patios since 2002.

The AFL-CIO launched Building Justice in 2006. The campaign, focused on the home-building sector in Nevada and Arizona, has involved more than 5,000 workers, many of whom work for subcontractors of Michigan-based housing giant Pulte Homes. Union representatives and workers have distributed pamphlets outside Pulte's local new-home communities, and they've held news conferences that feature local construction workers discussing their treatment on the job.

Pulte officials have countered that they don't employ the staff members of subcontractors, and they're not responsible for the relationships between subcontractors and their workers. They've also said the AFL-CIO is targeting Pulte in its organizing campaigns to generate publicity.

Westmark Homes, a Las Vegas company that builds attached housing, is developing Mira Villa.

John Smirk, business manager and secretary-treasurer of the local painters union, said the group is planning additional activities to call attention to Pete King Nevada and other local contractors. He wouldn't disclose the plans, but he said the union has already helped Pete King Nevada workers hire an attorney to file a class action lawsuit related to the wage issue.

"These practices are not good for the industry," Smirk said. "It creates downward pressure on wages and on conditions for workers, and because the industry is so sensitive to price, it's going to be an environment, in residential at least, where workers cannot earn a decent wage."

Contact reporter Jennifer Robison at jrobison@reviewjournal.com or (702) 380-4512.