We have about 40 employees at Modesto Executive Electric. That number moves up and down as the work ebbs and flows, but the core of our crew stays put. Some of our people have been with us 15 years. Several are the sons and daughters of journeymen who still work here. All of them live within 80 miles of our shop.
This spring, we went before the San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors to talk about what project labor agreements (PLAs) would mean for those people. Afterward, we sat down with Eric Christen of the Coalition for Fair Employment in Construction to explain why we showed up.
You can watch that interview here:
We started in a bedroom office 37 years ago
Tori founded Modesto Executive Electric in 1989 and ran it out of her bedroom with her ex-husband. In 2017, the two of us, Kevin and Tori, bought him out, and we got married in 2018 and have run the company together ever since.
Kevin is a third-generation electrician. He grew up in Modesto, spent years traveling for large industrial and commercial jobs, then came home to work here. Now we own it together.
Today our crews wire schools, parks, fire stations and police stations for cities, counties and the state across the Central Valley. About 90% of what we build is public work.
We’re a family company in every sense. Several of our own kids work here. So do the sons of journeymen who have been with us for years.
What a PLA asks of a merit-based shop
We’re a non-union contractor. We bid public projects and complete them with our own crew.
A PLA changes that. To bid the job, we’d have to sign an agreement with the union and hire through the union hall. The electricians who have been with us for a decade would sit out. In their place, we’d get people we don’t know, who don’t know how we work, and who most likely aren’t from this area.
Local hire should start with local contractors
Agencies often adopt PLAs to promote local hiring. We’ve seen it work the other way. When a union hall can’t fill a job, it pulls workers from across California and sometimes from out of state.
If the goal is local hire, give the work to local contractors. Our families live here, and they depend on these jobs and the wages we pay.
Why our crew stays
We try to make everybody feel like part of the ME family, and we say it often enough that our crew could probably say it back to us.
That shows up in 401(k) matching, health and dental coverage, and time together off the clock. We’ve gone to baseball games and taken a houseboat out on Don Pedro, and this year’s casino party was a crowd favorite.
It also shows up in choices. Prevailing wage rates are set on public jobs, but how our employees use their pay is up to them. Someone already covered on a spouse’s health plan can opt out of ours and take that money home. Someone who likes managing his own investments can put his retirement money where he wants.
Several of our employees have told us flat out that if we went union, they’d leave. We believe them. They’d go in a heartbeat.
The only dues anyone pays here are the dues of learning how to do the job properly.
13 apprentices, trained the ABC way
We’ve been part of ABC NorCal for nearly three decades, and Tori serves on its board. Every apprentice we hire trains through ABC to become a state-licensed journeyman with skilled and trained certification.
When we filmed this interview, we had 13 apprentices in the program, each with us a year or longer. Two graduated this spring after finishing their entire apprenticeship here. We know firsthand what this training produces.
Under a PLA, those apprentices couldn’t work our public jobs.
The work we’ve already lost
We used to do work for Stockton Unified School District. We used to do work for the City of Stockton. Both adopted PLAs, and we haven’t worked for either since. Other agencies in the area have followed.
The latest version goes by a new name: the Community Workforce Training Agreement, or CWTA. For our crew, nothing changes. We still couldn’t put our apprentices or our journeymen on the job.
That’s why we’re so vocal about this. It could put us out of business.
A message to the supervisors
We’re not against the union. We’re not trying to stop them from doing their job. All we ask is that you don’t stop us from doing ours.
These agreements shut out about 90% of the local workforce, close off open bidding, raise project costs, and put family shops like ours at risk.
Every one of our employees has a family. Many have kids. So when you’re weighing a PLA, think about those families and those workers. If a shop like ours goes under, where are they supposed to find a job?
Want to weigh in on the San Joaquin County decision? Learn more at sjcupdate.com.
Work for a school district, city or agency weighing a PLA? Talk with us. Looking for a career with a crew that keeps its people? See open positions here: https://www.modestoexecutiveelectric.com/careers