Re: Local Contracting Preference Interpretation; Request for Comment, ID: GCERC

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Re: Local Contracting Preference Interpretation; Request for Comment, ID: GCERC"

Brett Henderson
5 years ago
Views:

1 Will D. Spoon Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Council 500 Poydras Street, Suite 1117 New Orleans, LA Re: Local Contracting Preference Interpretation; Request for Comment, ID: GCERC Dear Mr. Spoon, As leaders of a wide variety of Gulf Coast organizations and businesses, we are pleased to submit the following comments to the notice on interpretation and implementation of 33 U.S.C. 1321(t)(2)(C)(vii)(V), the local preference requirement of the Resources and Ecosystem Sustainability, Tourist Opportunities, and Revived Economies of the Gulf Coast States Act of 2012 (RESTORE Act). We represent stakeholders in community, tribal, faith, economic and workforce development, and conservation organizations across the five Gulf Coast states. Together, our organizations believe the Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Council should develop strong, targeted standard contract terms to ensure the Council s local preference delivers the full range of economic benefits to workers, vulnerable communities, and local economies that Congress intended. We have significant concerns about the limited nature of the contract terms laid out in the Council s notice for interpretation and implementation (GCERC ). Such a limited approach represents a missed opportunity for the Council to advance the goals of its Comprehensive Plan to enhance community resilience, create opportunities for new and existing businesses of all sizes, and support ecosystem restoration that builds local workforce capacity ; it also represents a failure to meet the intentions detailed by the Congress in creating a duty to develop these contract terms. We believe the Council should implement local preferences that not only support the use of local businesses, but which also require contractors to include workforce development plans outlining good faith action to support the hiring and training local workers, including low income, displaced and disadvantaged workers, within their contract bids and when possible under law, the Council should evaluate the strength of these plans as part of the contract award decision. These recommendations fall in line with those developed by Oxfam America, LSU School of Business and the International Economic Development Council in their report, Contracting Preferences for RESTORE Act-Funded Projects: Recommendations to the Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Council. While the 2010 BP oil disaster caused significant damage to the environment, it also delivered a serious blow to the economic, social, and cultural health of the Gulf s coastal communities. The spill has had a lasting impact on communities that rely on natural resources for their livelihoods and way of life. When Congress tasked the Council with developing contract terms that give preference to Gulf Coast state workers and businesses, Congress was deliberately seeking to help local working families--especially those who were economically displaced by the spill, or from low-income and disadvantaged communities--to access new job opportunities tied to restoring these resources. In its local preference proposal, the Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Council has a unique opportunity to catalyze a new relationship: between investments in restoring the health of the Gulf s natural resources, the 1 P a g e

2 economic opportunity and resiliency of its most at-risk working families, and the success of a growing new regional industry sector. Implementing the Council s Funded Priorities List will create new demand for contractors designing, constructing and administering projects, as well demand for thousands of skilled workers. Through more targeted contract terms, the Council can help local workers to access good jobs in careers such as environmental technicians, heavy equipment operators, deckhands, field inspectors, welders and commercial divers. The Council s contract terms should not only promote the use of local businesses, but should also promote contractors forging new partnerships: to identify, train, and hire qualified local, low-income and disadvantaged workers. Doing so could help to train the next generation of skilled restoration professionals, while also fostering pathways out of poverty and building greater resiliency in our coastal communities. The Council can help to foster a growing new cluster of firms fueled by a stronger local workforce specializing in fields connected to the region s restoration. Additionally, by focusing on providing working families and businesses along the coast with access to restoration work, we can help to promote greater stewardship of our natural resources among broader sectors of the public and industry, helping to build greater support for future restoration and conservation. As the Council s interpretation and implementation suggests, existing state law may prevent the Council from attaching certain grant award conditions for states to give a weighted preference to companies located in another Gulf Coast state. Still, the Council could include special grant award conditions to require good faith action by contractors and transparency supporting the use of local workers by including contract clauses requiring contractors to promote new job openings with state workforce offices. Additional clauses could require contractors to develop workforce development plans for good faith action reaching out to local workers including documenting any partnerships with local workforce and community institutions, including reaching workers who are low-income, who reside in low-income census tracts, who are displaced homemakers, or who are members of targeted groups as defined in Internal Revenue Code Section 51(d) about local employment and training. Such clause could also include processes for tracking forthcoming job openings, and use and training of local workers. Federal contracts should include similar contract clauses to those listed above. In addition, the strength of proposed workforce development plans and the use of locally based companies should be an evaluation factor in awarding contracts, with a strong, standard weight across federal procurement on Council-funded projects and programs. We believe such factors should count for no less than twenty percent of a contract award decision, making efforts to support community engagement through workforce development on a project as important as any technical design plan developed for a project. By evaluating these plans and giving them a strong, standard weight, we believe the Council will be able to more fully evaluate the ability of contractors to advance the Council s environmental and economic goals. We look forward to working with you along the way to build a more vibrant, productive future for the Gulf of Mexico and the region s restoration economy. Thank you for your consideration of this request, and please let us know if we can provide additional information or assistance. For additional information, please contact Jeffrey Buchanan with Oxfam America at (202) or jbuchanan@oxfamamerica.org. 2 P a g e

3 Sincerely, 232-Help/Louisiana 211 A Community Voice - Louisiana Air Alliance Houston Alabama Coast United Alabama State Association of Cooperatives American Baptist Home Mission Societies Asian Americans for Change Atchafalaya Basinkeeper BFA Environmental Boat People SOS Bread for the World New Orleans Cahaba Riverkeeper Calhoun County Resource Watch Carmelite NGO Climb CDC Coastal Communities Consulting Community Training Works Crescent City Media Group Disaster Accountability Project Dulac Community Center Earth Ethics Fe y Justicia Worker Center Federation of Southern Cooperatives, Rural Training and Research Center First People's Conservation Council of Louisiana Florida Clean Water Network Franklin's Promise Coalition Grand Bayou Indian Tribe Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center Gulf Islands Conservancy Gulf Restoration Network Hijra House Hope Haven Children s Services (Lafayette, LA) (Orange Beach, AL) (Forkland, AL) (Washington, DC) (Ocean Springs, MS) (Orlando, FL) (Bayou La Batre, AL) (Birmingham, AL) (Seadrift, TX) (Gretna, LA) (Melbourne Beach, FL) (Dulac, LA) (Pensacola, FL) (Epes, Alabama) (Houma, LA) (Navarre, FL) (Franklin County, FL) (Grand Bayou, LA) (Gulfport, MS) (Bay St. Louis, MS) 3 P a g e

4 Idle No More- Gulf Coast Immaculate Heart CDC Isle de Jean Charles Band of Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Indians Joseph's Trawl Manufacturing Land Trust Louisiana Limitless Vistas, Inc. Louisiana Bucket Brigade Louisiana Environmental Action Network (LEAN) Louisiana Housing Alliance Louisiana Shrimp Association Lower Mississippi Riverkeeper Lowlander Center Mary Queen of Viet Nam CDC Mississippi Coalition for Vietnamese American Fisherfolk and Families Mobile Baykeeper Moore Community House Women in Construction Program On Wings Of Care One Voice Louisiana OneStop Business Institute, Inc. Operation Homecare, Inc Oxfam America PLBA Housing Development Corporation ReThink Energy Florida Southern United Neighborhoods - SUN Steps Coalition Student Conservation Association - Houston Texas Office Texas Shrimp Association The Corps Network TRAC TruFund Union of Commercial Oystermen of Texas VIET Visions of Hope (Rayne, LA) (Lucedale, MS) (Isle de Jean Charles, LA) (Grand Isle, LA) (Gray, LA) (York, AL) (Boston, MA) (Eutaw, AL) (Washington, DC) (Thibodaux, LA) (Belle Chase, LA) (Port O'Connor, TX) 4 P a g e

5 Young American Conservation Corps (YACC) Zion Travelers Cooperative Center (Melbourne Beach, FL) (Phoenix, LA) 5 P a g e

RE: Public Comments on the BP Oil Spill Consent Decree and Draft Programmatic Damage Assessment and Restoration Plan

RE: Public Comments on the BP Oil Spill Consent Decree and Draft Programmatic Damage Assessment and Restoration Plan December 4th, 2015 The Honorable John C. Cruden Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and Natural Resources Division U.S. Department of Justice 950 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20530-0001