As you may already know, on June 6th the Michigan legislature passed legislation that repealed Michigan’s long-standing prevailing wage law. The 53-year-old prevailing wage law required that union-scale wages be paid to workers on state funded public construction projects.
“So now what?” you might ask … the following is what we know and understand today:
You should understand that this repeal of Michigan’s state prevailing wage has no impact on federally funded projects that have Davis-Bacon prevailing wage requirements. If you currently have a federally funded project, or if you are bidding on a project that is federally funded, the Davis-Bacon prevailing wage requirements and compliance protocols remain unchanged.
Although the legislative repeal of the state prevailing wage law is said to have “immediate effect”, several state departments have told us they are working internally and with the Attorney General (AG) to determine a working “effective date” for the repeal (i.e. the date after which state prevailing wage requirements would no longer be included in state funded construction projects).
MDOT has informed us that there may be state funded projects advertised in their upcoming lettings that may still include state prevailing wage requirements. Internally, MDOT is waiting on direction from the MDOT AG as to the “effective date” of the state prevailing wage law repeal. When the “effective date” is determined, addenda for advertised projects will be issued formally withdrawing the state prevailing wage requirements from those impacted projects. We encourage all bidders to closely monitor the MDOT lettings webpage watching for (and acknowledging) any addendum that removes the state prevailing wage requirements from a project you are bidding. If no addendum is issued that removes the state prevailing wage requirements, then you must bid the project with state prevailing wages included.
On state funded construction projects let by other public owners, where the advertisement still includes a state prevailing wage requirement, we recommend that bidders contact those public owners pre-bid to question the inclusion of a state prevailing wage requirement, and to get that owners direction on how you should react to the state prevailing wage requirement when bidding the project.
For state funded projects let and put under contract with state prevailing wage requirements, it is our understanding that the state prevailing wage requirements will not be removed from those projects in some retroactive or prospective way.
MITA has reached out to the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (LARA), Wage & Hour Division, to get their formal guidance on the implementation of the repeal of the state prevailing wage. However, like MDOT, they are also working internally and with the AG on those formal guidance documents.
We will keep all members informed as we learn and understand more about how the repeal of Michigan’s prevailing wage law will be implemented. If formal guidance documents are provided by LARA or any other state agency, we will pass those documents along also.
If you have any questions, please contact Lance Binoniemi, VP of Government Affairs, at lancebinoniemi@thinkmita.org, Glenn Bukoski, VP of Engineering Services, at glennbukoski@thinkmita.org, or Rachelle VanDeventer, VP of Industry Relations, at rachellevandeventer@thinkmita.
