YOUNGSTOWN Use of nonunion labor stalls funds

The nonprofit builder is scrambling to find the money some other way.
By ROGER G. SMITH
CITY HALL REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- It appears another nonprofit housing project will have to forgo city money just like last year.
That's because the issue over who is building those homes lingers from last year, too.
City council put the transfer of $168,900 for a 10-home project already under way into the third of three readings Wednesday at the suggestion of Michael Rapovy, D-5th.
The item will come to a vote at the next council meeting, and Rapovy thinks he has the votes to kill the measure and withhold the money.
Nonunion labor: Rapovy, a construction worker, remains unhappy that CHOICE (Community Housing Options Involving Cooperative Efforts) and Jubilee Homes continue using nonunion, out-of town-contractors, including the Amish. He also questions the safety of the workers and the size and quality of the homes they build.
The same concerns last year led council to unveil a project labor agreement. Nonprofit and other construction projects that use city money have to follow the agreement or forfeit the local funding.
When that happened, neither CHOICE nor Jubilee chose not to take city money, they continued their project, and they still haven't signed any agreements with the city.
The two agencies recently merged operations, although they remain separate groups. Phil Smith, CHOICE executive director, is handling the details of both groups' building projects.
The $168,900 at issue was supposed to help secure a $1.2 million construction loan for 10 South Side homes that already have foundations dug, Smith said.
When that was delayed, the loan didn't go through. Now, he is scrambling to find the money some other way.
"I'm building now with no money. I'm building on a prayer," he said.
Response: Smith counters Rapovy's positions with the same arguments as before:
First, virtually all residential homes in the Mahoning Valley are built with nonunion labor. CHOICE and Jubilee homes do have union labor on the mechanical work.
Second, the homes are inspected by the city and a private firm and are of good quality. Third, the lots aren't bigger because sizable parcels aren't available.
Rapovy dismisses those arguments.
Mechanical work makes up a small percentage of a new home's cost, he said. Amish workers put up the home frames.
"That's where most of the money goes," Rapovy said.
He calls the nonprofit project "plastic homes" the size of houses built in the 1920s, which is unacceptable to him.
New $100,000 homes being built on the West Side, in the same price range as the nonprofit homes, are superior, he said.
"There's something wrong there. There's a problem somewhere," he said.
rgsmith@vindy.com