City Budgets Squndered on Pointless Union Giveaways: New at Reason

“Project labor agreements” requiring union contracts on most government work are spreading in California.

Steven Greenhut writes:

Talk to almost any city or school district official, and it won’t take long before the poor-mouthing begins. Budgets are stretched to the bone. There’s barely enough money to pave the roads and pay for textbooks. If only taxpayers would pay more, there might be enough money to improve services or better educate the kids.

Yet with every tax hike and bond measure, services never really improve. That’s because the problem isn’t a lack of money, but the foolish way that officials spend what they’ve got. And few cities have behaved of late more foolishly than Santa Ana, Calif., whose policies should offer a warning for others.

Earlier this month, the Santa Ana City Council voted unanimously to approve the county’s first citywide “project labor agreement” for most city-funded construction projects. Councilman Jose Solorio called the vote “historic,” which it is, but only in the sense that it’s a historically bad move that will hurt Santa Ana residents by assuring they get fewer public services.

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