The stunning skyline of New York City rises up around us, fluid in its shape as new skyscrapers are erected every year. But as buildings and their developers continue to climb higher, an important group has been left below, disregarded—used and discarded. We’ve seen it time and again, across borough, state and nation: workers are treated with even less care than the raw materials with which they build. For too long, the construction workers who risk their safety every day just to go to work have faced this danger without proper preparation or protection. Workers are being injured, even killed—and most of those injured have been immigrants and workers of color, the exploited workforce. This neglect is unacceptable. We must do better—and we will.
The City Council has been working for some time to pass the Construction Safety Act, a wide-ranging package of bills to protect our construction workers. Monday, the mayor signed one of those bills into law. Intro 1447-C, which I sponsored along with Council Member Carlos Menchaca, creates a baseline requirement of safety training hours for every worker who sets foot on a job site in New York. It is a law we reached after extensive deliberation, revision and consideration. All of which was worth it, because it is of utmost importance to ensure that under this law, everyone is better prepared and no one is left behind.
Under this new law, construction workers are required to receive at least 40 hours of safety training. No one can argue that such training would not be beneficial, even lifesaving, for our New Yorkers in hard hats. We worked tirelessly for months with people from all affected groups, never losing sight of the ultimate goal—to protect New Yorkers of all affiliations and backgrounds.
New York’s construction workforce is as diverse as the city they build. That’s why we’ve made sure that safety extends to everyone: union, nonunion and day laborers. Everyone who dons a hard hat should be given the right tools to remain safe. To ensure this safety, the City Council has committed to spending $5 million to help make the training accessible at low or no cost to those most in need. Spending $5 million isn’t nothing. It’s a start, and we’re ready to contribute additional funding as time goes on.
That $5 million, plus any funds allotted in the future, is reserved for unaffiliated workers, day laborers and MWBE employees who might otherwise not be able to afford the training. Each worker is only truly safe when all workers on a site are trained. As I said before passing the bill, I would not have supported this law without this funding commitment to promote safety for all.
I would never presume to know every detail of the construction industry, every challenge that workers face. And so we spent months hearing from anyone and everyone with something to say. Anyone who wanted a seat at the table as we deliberated had one. Every voice was heard and every concern considered. Those who would argue otherwise are lobbing baseless accusations rather than acknowledging and involving themselves in the months of work dedicated to making sure that this training would be accessible to everyone. There have been more versions of this bill than almost any we bring before the City Council, a reality that reflects the degree to which we worked to address all concerns and consider all perspectives. Many of the arguments raised by critics can be silenced simply by a reading of the final bill.
I can only conclude that many of the people who are attacking this law are doing so with deliberate misinformation designed to stoke fears that this bill will harm, rather than protect, nonunion workers of more color. In reality, the opposite is true. This law includes numerous provisions to ensure that the training is accessible to all. OSHA training, for example, meets the requirements laid out in this law, which is more accessible than other methods. Proctored online training options are available to further expand the reach of the training and our capacity to meet the needs of our workers. If for any reason we’re unable to meet those goals on our initial timeline, the process can be delayed to ensure all are included.
Much like a job site, we all have to be able ttrust each other for this initiative to work. To ensure that access to this training is a reality for all workers, regardless of background, immigration status or union status, we’ll be working with groups already committed to similar goals. We want to build out and expand the operations of those who are already providing training of this kind to those who otherwise couldn’t access it. And because, like all fields, the construction industry changes, workers will have an eight-hour refresher course every five years.
One change in the construction industry is not a welcome one. There has been an alarming erosion in the culture of safety at construction sites. Worker well-being has been sacrificed for expediency and profit, and this disastrous exchange has a real, human cost. Even on the day after we passed this bill out of committee, two workers were killed at two separate job sites. That cannot, must not, be written off as the “cost of doing business. Responsibility for worker safety needs to start at the top, and that means developers need to know that when a worker is injured or killed on their site, they bear that responsibility. Many opposing this law seem to be deliberately misinforming the public because they value money over safety, and that needs to change now.
The culture of treating human life as one more resource runs deep. But this law, and the package of laws crafted by my colleagues, will mark the first shift toward reversing that and making sure construction workers and their families know they’ll come home at the end of the day. I’m proud of the part I’ve played and the part I continue to play in keeping our workers and their families safe and secure. The culture of the construction industry is deeply damaged. But we can rebuild it.