It was a sea of orange outside City Hall in Lower Manhattan on Thursday, July 13, as union carpenters and elected leaders gathered together to call out the New York City Economic Development Corporation (EDC) for breaking their promise to employ union workers in the construction of Willets Point.
For the project, first announced decades ago, the EDC hired East Coast Drilling to oversee construction. Now, union carpenters are calling out the EDC for allowing contractors to employ non-union workers for the construction at Willets Point and not requiring workers to undergo a state-certified apprenticeship program to ensure the project’s buildings are built safely by “skilled labor.”
