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In an executive order that was quietly released, Gov. Scott Walker recently suspended rules requiring contractors on state construction projects to employ workers under the state’s apprenticeship program. The rules have existed since 1971. One Milwaukee-area lawmaker is protesting Walker’s order, saying it will hurt efforts to employ minorities in the construction trades in Wisconsin.

In the apprenticeship program, which is overseen by the state Department of Workforce Development, contractors provide on-the-job training in a skilled trade to apprentices and also pay them wages as they attend classes at a technical college or other institution. The program is carried out at the local level by the state’s 94 local trade committees, boards staffed by local employer and employee representatives.

(photo by adrian palomo)

The program is voluntary. In 1971, to encourage contractors to join it, Democratic Gov. Pat Lucey first issued an executive order requiring contractors awarded state construction contracts to participate in the program and employ apprentices. In 2005, in another order, Doyle, also a Democrat, revised the requirements, hoping to strengthen them and step up state enforcement. These rules stood until Walker’s own order earlier this month.

For now, the future of these rules is uncertain. Walker’s order, issued earlier this month, says Doyle’s previous directive “is suspended and shall have no effect until further action is taken relating to the employment of apprentices on state construction projects.” Walker’s office didn’t return a request for comment on Wednesday.

The DWD website tells contractors that, as of March 9, “You are no longer subject to the apprentice utilization requirements.  In all cases, no further compliance investigations or determinations, including those that are pending, will be made by the Bureau of Apprenticeship Standards.”

For many years, the state apprenticeship program has been a focus of efforts to diversify to construction trades in Wisconsin. State Rep. Barbara Toles (D-Milwaukee) says suspending the rules “will negatively impact people’s ability to gain access to apprenticeships, especially minorities and women.”

According to the representative, the apprenticeship program “is practically the only path to employment in the construction trades for minorities and women.”

Walker’s executive order, his 18th, was not distributed as a press release, unlike the prior 17, each of which can still be read on the “Media Center” section of the governor’s website.

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John Mielke, vice-president of the Associated Builders and Contractors, a trade association representing non-union contractors, told The Daily Reporter in January that the first thing he’d like the new governor to do “is rescind Executive Order 108” – Doyle order requiring apprentices on state projects. Mielke said DWD, in response to the order, had created 50 pages of new rules. “It has taken on a life of its own. It’s become a multi-headed beast, and I would urge the governor to kill it quickly.”

An audit by the nonpartisan Legislative Audit Bureau, released in September, recommended the state apprenticeship program try harder to diversify its ranks. In the Milwaukee metro area, minority applicants accounted for about 37 percent of those accepted into the program between 2006 and 2009 but only 16 percent of those placed with companies (where the on-the-job training begins). Women applicants made up 5 percent of those approved but just 1.5 percent of those placed with companies.

The audit also found that the tougher enforcement called for in Doyle’s executive order was rarely applied. Auditors found only one instance between 2006 and 2009 in which the state took any kind of action against contractors for not meeting Doyle’s standards, and in that case, the Department of Administration only delayed payments to the contractor temporarily. The order grants the state the power to deny payments or cancel contracts for breaking apprenticeship rules.

But the order was also designed to be flexible, providing several ways that a contractor could be deemed “in compliance,” and other avenues allowing the state to grant waivers. Those were well-utilized: Between 2006 and 2009, 45 percent of contracts were given exemptions from the apprenticeship rules. About 48 percent were found to be in compliance, and 1.5 percent were labeled “non-compliant.”

Toles is non-sympathetic to many of the waivers. “They use all kinds of excuses,” she says.

Plus, auditors found the Department of Administration and the Department of Transportation – the two departments awarding the contracts that fall under the apprenticeship rules – were waiting until after they had awarded projects before asking DWD to determine if the bid-winner could comply with said rules. (In response to the audit, DOA, DOT and DWD sought to revise and improve this process.)

Toles says she’s working on legislation that would recreate the Doyle rules in the form of state statutes.

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