DECEMBER 2021 • LONGISLANDPRESS.COM 25
LABORERS LOCAL 66
RALLY AGAINST SBU CONTRACT
The sight of big, blown-up, inflatable rats was hard to ignore during the morning hours in front of Stony Brook University.
BY JENNIFER CORR
Union construction workers from
Long Island are protesting a New
Jersey-based company’s winning a $37
million contract to renovate and modernize
the main lecture hall at Stony
Brook University.
The picketers lined up on Nov. 2 with giant
infl atable rats and open coffi ns outside
the south entrance of the university
with a sign that read, “Stony Brook
University, stop using irresponsible
contractors and start paying prevailing
wages.” But the university maintains
that the contract to repair the Jacob
K. Javits Lecture Center was awarded
fairly to the nonunion construction
company Niram Inc. and that wage laws
are being followed.
“Basically what they’re doing is using
out-of-state contractors that are from
New Jersey on taxpayers’ money,” said
Anthony Speziale, an organizer with
Laborers Local 66, a Melville-based
union that represents about 1,000 skilled
construction craft laborers in Nassau
and Suff olk counties. “It should really be
... local contractors that are doing this job.”
The union is the local chapter of the
Laborers International Union of North
America. This is not the fi rst time the
State University Construction Fund has
used the same fi rm that specializes in
green building processes. Since 2009,
the fund has awarded fi ve other projects
at state universities to Niram.
According to the university website, the
State University Construction Fund
awarded Niram the work to perform a “major
rehab of the 1968 lecture hall.” Existing
lecture halls will be renovated, technology
will be upgraded, and mechanical, electrical
and safety systems will be replaced.
“Our ultimate goal is to get Stony Brook
to give us a project labor agreement on
this job,” said New Hyde Park resident
John Keenan, a business agent from LIUNA
Local 78, a Queens-based union that
represents about 3,500 asbestos, lead,
and hazardous waste handlers in New
York City, Long Island, and New Jersey. “If
we have the project labor agreement, we
will get good contractors in for the right
wage, getting medical benefi ts and everything
else for the workers. Our ultimate
goal is to get SUNY to do this, the state university,
to bring good contractors, safe
contractors and New York contractors.”
In a statement, university offi cials confi
rmed that the contract was publicly
bid and awarded by the State University
Construction Fund to the lowest
qualifi ed bidder in accordance with
New York State Finance Law.
“Stony Brook University is not administering
the contract,” the statement
read. “While Niram is a nonunion general
contractor, who is self-performing
some of the work with their own staff ,
Niram has also been hiring union labor
to supplement their staff .”
The statement also confi rmed that the
state requires that the company pay
Suff olk County prevailing wages to
whomever they hire on the project,
union or nonunion, and that it’s been
verifi ed that all workers on the Javits
Lecture Center project are being paid
prevailing wages.
“We are the ones paying taxes on Long
Island and in New York State and by
giving it to these New Jersey workers,
it’s no benefi t to our community and
our guys are out of work because of it,”
Speziale said.
“It should really be ...
local contractors that
are doing this job,”
said Anthony Speziale
/LONGISLANDPRESS.COM
