Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr. today announced that last year his office collected more than $5 million in back wages for workers who were illegally underpaid by New York City contractors - by far the most collected for prevailing wage violations in a single year during the last five years.

“My office has helped hundreds of workers recover wages owed to them by municipal contractors who failed to comply with the law,” Thompson said. “Our prevailing wage laws are important to taxpayers who want high quality construction work done safely.”

Thompson added: “These laws are critical to workers who deserve to make a decent living and work in safe conditions. They are important to honest businesses who want to compete fairly for government contracts”.

The New York City Comptroller enforces State laws that require private sector companies to pay employees prevailing wages and benefits when they work on “public works” contracts with the City for construction or for building services. Thompson also enforces New York City’s living wage law that sets minimum wage rates for security guards employed by City contractors, home attendants, day care workers and several other job titles, when they are employed by City contractors.  

In 2006, Thompson’s Bureau of Labor Law recovered $5,002,083 in underpayments for workers, one of the highest such amounts ever collected by any City Comptroller.  Among other 2006 achievements:

• The Comptroller assessed $414,950 in penalties against contractors who violated labor law, by far the highest amount in the administration’s history.

• The Comptroller secured the biggest prevailing wage settlement ever in the history of the Comptroller’s office in terms of the number of workers to be paid back wages because of prevailing wage violations. In 2006, John C. Mandel Security was forced to pay $754,307 in unpaid benefits and interest to 720 security guards the firm shortchanged in 2004.

• The Comptroller entered into a settlement in which Netexit, Inc., pursuant to which it paid nearly $1.5 million to 16 employees who were underpaid for work at Human Resources Administration sites throughout the City. The workers ran, installed and repaired telephone and data cables at 49 agency offices in the five boroughs for more than two years. In this case, the contractor declared bankruptcy and then argued that the Comptroller could no longer pursue a prevailing wage claim against it. Thompson countered that his office was still empowered to pursue the claim despite the bankruptcy, and the Bankruptcy Court agreed.
  
  
• In 2006, an administrative law judge ruled in the Comptroller’s favor and found that prevailing wage laws apply when a private owner converts its property to a New York City public school, pursuant to a lease agreement with the Department of Education. The judge’s ruling stemmed from a case involving the High School for Information Technology in Queens. As a result, 20 construction laborers who were underpaid for work renovating this school shared a $1.1 million settlement funded by the School Construction Authority.
  
  
• The Comptroller launched an “Immigrant Prevailing Wage & Living Wage Outreach Campaign”, partnering with various immigrant and advocacy groups with the goal of ensuring that immigrants and other workers are paid the wages and benefits required by law when working on government contracts. 

Over the last five years, the Bureau of Labor Law has resolved 744 prevailing and living wage cases, assessed $11,376,761 in underpayments for workers and assessed more than $1,105,495 in fines against contractors. Since taking office, Thompson also has debarred 19 contractors from doing business with the City as a result of labor law violations.

 “Prevailing and living wage laws are about helping hard working people and creating a better New York for all of us,” said Thompson. “I am proud to enforce them and I am proud to help working New Yorkers get the wages they deserve.”

You can view the Comptroller’s Prevailing Wage Newsletters and the Prevailing Wage schedule at www.comptroller.nyc.gov.

###