Jeff Moreland has led Raimore Construction through two decades of growth, from a small trucking and flagging outfit to a formidable heavy civil contractor that recently was awarded an approximately $60 million contract – the largest ever in Oregon for a minority-owned contractor – for transit improvements.

Despite his prominence within Portland’s building industry, Moreland – who is Black – still experiences racism on jobsites. Oftentimes, he said, it’s from people who don’t even realize that it’s going on.

“I can walk into a trailer as the owner of Raimore Construction with one of my project managers who’s white, and they talk to him the whole meeting until they realize that I’m the decision maker,” Moreland said. “This is just systemic.”

Robert Camarillo, an ironworker who now serves as executive secretary of the Oregon State Building and Construction Trades Council, has experienced similar discrimination during his 25 years in the industry.

“Some of us are just used to being invisible,” he said. “It’s not just what is said, but it’s the actions that are hurtful. This is an industry issue that’s plagued not just the construction industry, but all levels of the business, from the developers to the engineers to the architects. All levels.”

Racism in the building industry takes many forms, including the implicit bias experienced by Moreland and Camarillo, discriminatory practices and a lack of opportunities for minority workers and business owners, and symbols of racial violence being placed on jobsites in Portland and other parts of the country.

As the nation comes to a reckoning on racism and discrimination in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd, leaders in the local building industry are working to create a dialogue to address causes and potential solutions to racism in construction. Moreland and Camarillo were among multiple panelists who spoke Tuesday during an that drew more than 300 participants. The session was held by the National Association of Minority Contractors‘ Oregon chapter.

The first step to prevent continuing racism and discrimination on jobsites, Moreland said, is to acknowledge that it is a widespread problem, and not try to sweep it under the rug. An open dialogue is necessary, he added, because minorities in the industry often don’t feel safe speaking out for fear of being penalized or ostracized.

“You have to realize that this has been cultivated over a long period of time, and the discriminatory, racist behavior that you see has become normalized,” he said.

Andrew Colas, president of Colas Construction, said the industry needs to adopt a zero-tolerance policy for racist behavior and prioritize enforcement in the same manner that it has for safety. Decades ago, injuries and deaths were considered an acceptable risk to construction work before the industry took a stand and decided to make a change. Now, it’s common to see companies with multiple safety directors.

“I don’t think we’ve ever stopped and assessed how bad it is in regards to racism in this industry, and really decided that we’re going to make a fullhearted effort to change,” Colas said. “You have to put time into it, just like you spend time on making sure safety is important, we have to put time and focus into this.”

Forming bias incident response teams could make victims of jobsite racism more likely to report the abuse, said Willy Myers, executive secretary-treasurer of the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council. Then workers experiencing racial harassment could work directly with the general contractor and would have an intervenor to turn to who is not a direct supervisor or business representative.

“A lot of times there’s a fear of being excluded from the next job or being excluded from a team that’s already built on a jobsite because they’re the person pointing out a problem,” he said.

Further, penalties are needed for people terminated for bias issues, Myers said. Moving them to another jobsite or placing them on the out-of-work list and allowing them back after a short suspension isn’t fixing the problem, he said.

Diversifying the ranks of those working in the industry is crucial, Colas said, calling for labor unions to recruit minorities who are already in their ranks to fill leadership roles on jobsites. Young people of color need to see people who look like them not only in roles as tradespeople, but as foremen and women, estimators, project managers and executives.

“If you can’t see it, you can’t be it,” he said.

Investing in local, minority-owned businesses needs to be a priority for banks and governments that are funding projects, said Alando Simpson, CEO of City of Roses Disposal & Recycling. Using public resources to elevate minority-owned firms and hire more people of color would mean those dollars stay local and benefit the overall community and create a more self-sustaining economy in the Portland-metro area, he said.

Colas agreed, calling on public agencies to help create an atmosphere that is more inclusive and allows everybody to achieve the American Dream, which he argued isn’t as accessible as people believe. Colas Construction is one of the largest Black-owned companies on the West Coast, he said, but their revenues pale in comparison to those of their peers.

“I can tell you five companies that do double our revenues that we’ve been in business 15 years longer than,” he said. “The reality is there are barriers. When you look the way I look, there are barriers. And we need to work to get rid of those.”

To view a video of the forum, visit

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Sarah Moreno isn’t working much these days.

The heavy equipment operator has three kids – ages 12, 13 and 16 – at home. They would normally be in school, but with schools closed, Moreno is often home with them.

Moreno still goes to work whenever she can. Last week, she worked only one day – at a demolition site with contaminated soils at Portland International Airport for McDonald Excavating.

“You don’t want to use your kids as an excuse to miss work, especially me being a mom in the trades,” she said.

Moreno, an apprentice with Operating Engineers Local 701, moved to Portland from Southern California to take Constructing Hope‘s pre-apprenticeship program. Her kids can stay home by themselves, she said.

“They’re old enough now that I don’t really have to worry about it too much,” she said. “I’m grateful for that, because to find child care, it’s kind of hard.”

Many construction workers are juggling work and children during the COVID-19 pandemic. In recent weeks, contractors and subcontractors also have come to realize that their workers’ child care issues are increasingly their problem.

“I didn’t realize how many of our workers are single parents,” Maurice Rahming, co-owner of O’Neill Construction Group, said last week during an industry conference call that was organized by the Professional Business Development Group. “So with the schools being shut down, they’re responsible for taking care of their kids at home. They have to take the time off because they don’t have anyone else to take care of their kids.”

It can be difficult in the best of times for construction workers to find available and affordable child care. Before the coronavirus began to spread, labor groups in the Portland area were working to provide child care to pre-apprentices entering the industry. The Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council and allies were pitching a program called Labor’s Littles. Willy Myers, executive secretary of the labor council, said the group had asked Metro and other local governments to support the child care effort.

“We struggled to get public funding,” he said.

The COVID-19 pandemic has sharpened those concerns. Schools and day care facilities are closed, and many families are practicing social distancing from grandparents and other family members who would otherwise help out.

Child care is especially needed for beginning workers on labor’s lowest rungs.

“It’s more expensive than people can afford until they reach a certain level,” Myers said.

Meanwhile, the shutdowns of schools and day care facilities have been particularly difficult on women workers, minorities and those with lower incomes. Constructing Hope, a Portland nonprofit that operates a pre-apprenticeship program geared to serve formerly incarcerated people, women and people of color, is speaking with funders to reallocate money for child care.

“There’s really no availability for day care right now,” said Bobby Hamilton, case manager for Constructing Hope.

The pandemic could also slow the entry of new workers into the construction industry.

Anthony Williams, a heavy-machine operator apprentice at the Northwest College of Construction and a recent graduate of Constructing Hope, said he had to take time off from his part-time job at Subway to care for two of his children who live with him, a 7-year-old son and a 5-year-old daughter.

“My child care facility closed,” he said. “I wasn’t able to work for about two weeks until I figured it out. I was forced to try to find someone who does in-home care.”

Williams began taking online classes earlier this month at the Northwest College of Construction. The move to online education has slowed what’s usually a four-year process to become a journeyman.

“Things are moving real slow as far as classes go,” he said.

Williams, 41, entered construction after attempts to have a white-collar business career ran aground because of a 15-year-old felony on his record.

“Construction is the only thing you can go through that you can make a living wage,” he said.

Construction firms in fact have seen some employees come back to work after they were unsuccessful in obtaining unemployment benefits, said Robert Camarillo, executive secretary of the Oregon State Building and Construction Trades Council.

“We saw a lot of folks ask for voluntary layoffs early on,” he said. “What I’m hearing now, the reports that I’m getting, is a lot of those people that asked for those layoffs realized the unemployment system wasn’t there yet, wasn’t ready to be the safety net they were hoping. And so a lot of them have started to return to work.”

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Oregon Gov. Kate Brown joined Washington Gov. Jay Inslee at the Vancouver waterfront on Monday in a bid to place new urgency on replacing the Interstate Bridge over the Columbia River.

“This bridge could fall down any day with a small seismic event,” Inslee said.

Monday’s event, held at a new office building at The Waterfront Vancouver with a view of the bridge, came as a show of unity and purpose for the leaders of two states whose last attempt to rebuild the bridge dissolved into inaction and finger-pointing.

Inslee said those days of interstate acrimony are over.

“This is a new time and a new day in a variety of ways,” Inslee said, pointing to changes in the Washington Legislature and scientific advances that have deepened the understanding of seismic risks in the Pacific Northwest.

The two states have pledged a total of $44 million to form a joint bridge office to study past plans and evaluate new options. The previous attempt to build a new I-5 bridge ground to a halt in 2013 after the Washington Legislature declined to fund that state’s share of the Columbia River Crossing project.

Recently, a joint committee has met to begin anew the process of rallying for a new bridge.

Inslee took the lead in Monday’s press conference, saying the Interstate Bridge must be replaced.

“There is no option other than making this investment,” he said.

The bridge opened as a single span in 1917. The second span opened 41 years later.

In recent years, booming population growth in the Portland-metro area has added to pressures on the bridge. Many Portland-area workers live in Vancouver, where home prices are typically more affordable, and cross the bridge as part of their commutes. At the same time, economic growth and the rise of e-commerce shipping have greatly increased freight traffic.

“It is a traffic bottleneck that is not consistent with the economies of Oregon and Washington,” Inslee said.

Public agencies in Oregon are scrambling to prepare infrastructure for a sizable earthquake that could render many metro-area bridges impassable. In Portland, only the Sellwood Bridge and Tilikum Crossing are considered likely to remain operable after a worst-case earthquake.

The Interstate Bridge conversations mirror a push in Multnomah County to replace the 93-year-old Burnside Bridge.

Any replacement for the Interstate Bridge would cost billions of dollars. The price tag of the Columbia River Crossing was estimated at $3.3 billion to $4.1 billion in 2011, and construction costs have escalated sharply since.

Local opposition to light rail in Vancouver has created headaches for the project. Both Inslee and Brown insisted that any new bridge must carry what they called “high-capacity transit,” but neither specified whether that would be light rail or bus service. The existing bridge has minimal accommodations for non-vehicle users.

“What I think is critically important is we invest in high-capacity public transit on this bridge,” Brown said.

Inslee suggested a federal infrastructure package would need to be approved to provide funding for the project. The bridge is a critically important arterial connection that should be a national infrastructure priority, he said.

The press conference drew leaders from both states, although Portland commissioners were absent. Inslee planned to travel to Salem later Monday for more meetings with Oregon officials.

William Myers, executive secretary of the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council, said a Columbia River bridge project would be a boon for the trades.

“It’s going to put a lot of families to work,” he said.

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The Multnomah County Board of Commissioners last week voted to create the Construction Diversity and Equity Fund to pay for apprenticeship and retention programs for groups that have long been underrepresented in the construction industry.

The new fund will receive 1 percent from county remodeling projects with budgets greater than $200,000 and new construction projects that cost more than $1 million. The new policy will take effect July 1.

The county has undertaken more than $750 million worth of construction in the past few years, including approximately $324 million to replace the Sellwood Bridge. Officials said that in the past three years the county has undertaken no fewer than 38 remodeling projects that were worth $200,000 or more.

Money from the fund is intended to pay for pre-apprenticeship programs in the construction trades, employee retention programs and other supports for minorities and women in the industry. It will also support small certified businesses with technical aid and training in bidding, mentoring and other office support roles.

Portland YouthBuilders, a nonprofit that provides pre-apprenticeship training for low-income youth, was cited at the March 15 board meeting as an example of what the new fund would be backing. And with only 32 percent of women and 33 percent of minority apprentices continuing to the journey level, according to the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council, additional retention efforts are important in backing up that initial education.

“Highly skilled construction jobs are a ticket out of poverty,” Bill Kowalczyk, a former carpenter and teacher for Portland YouthBuilders, told county board members.

The county has already been working to boost minority participation in construction through the creation of labor agreements for major capital projects. The agreements include diversity hiring requirements.

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Supporters of Community Benefits Agreements (CBAs) were told Wednesday by Portland City Council members that whatever happens, high standards for workforce diversity would apply to a major utility-based construction project now rolling into action.

The different sides are still debating an equity plan for city construction projects drafted by Mayor Ted Wheeler, the Community Equity and Inclusion Plan. CBA supporters want the CEIP to closely resemble CBAs, which are considered union-friendly, and others want greater opportunities for minorities who own open-shop firms.

On Wednesday, the council held a procedural hearing related to a $146 million upgrade of the city’s Columbia Boulevard Wastewater Treatment Plant. Heavy work on the project won’t begin for about two years, but CBA advocates who testified were assured by council members the project would feature ambitious targets for gender and racial diversity.

“We’re concerned the city could be missing an opportunity,” said Kelly Haines of the Metropolitan Alliance for Workforce Equity.

Wheeler said Wednesday the sides are “weeks, not months” from agreement on the CEIP. He confirmed the main sticking point has been a threshold of $25 million stipulating projects use the CEIP.

Also at the hearing, the council voted unanimously to use the construction manager-general contractor alternative contracting method for the wastewater treatment plant project. The method, preferred by many builders for complex and/or risky projects, is also said to help firms meet workforce and subcontracting goals.

The debate over equitable contracting was going on long before Wheeler took office in January, but in April, his office released a draft CEIP that had the support of the National Association of Minority Contractors-Oregon, whose membership includes both union and open-shop firms. But the region’s largest construction worker union, the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council, along with many other nonprofit groups, opposed several conditions of the CEIP, notably a threshold exempting required use of the CEIP on projects valued over $25 million.

Built in 1952, the Columbia Boulevard Wastewater Treatment Plant today serves 600,000 Portlanders, handling an average of 76 million gallons per day. However, as a result of Portland’s , the plant now sees peaks of up to 450 million gallons in a day following heavy rain.

These wide variations require more biological treatment during a rain and increased resiliency, according to BES program manager Muriel Gueissaz-Teufel. The upgrades have been included in planning documents as far back as the 1990s. Beyond that, she said, regulators have mandated the city complete the project by 2024.

The first deadline is Saturday, when the city is required to notify the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality it’s implementing the project.

“The project is really about increasing the quality of treatment at the plant,” Gueissaz-Teufel said. “The EPA is asking that as much flow as possible be sent to biological treatment.”

The project addresses deferred maintenance needs, upgrades of technical systems and rolls in several long-needed capital projects at the treatment plant. It adds 15,000 square feet of storage space and 5,000 square feet of staff space, as well as add two wet-weather clarifiers and replacement of odor control systems. Wastewater clarifiers are large basins that allow for the separation of sediments.

“(Clarifiers) are low-profile structures that are essentially full of water,” Gueissaz-Teufel said.

The existing clarifiers at the treatment plant will remain in place.

Construction costs for the project are budgeted at $89 million. The overall project budget of $146 million includes predesign, design, construction and permitting. Funding comes from sewer ratepayers via the Sewer System Operating Fund.

Mike Jordan, director of the Bureau of Environmental Services, said the will help by providing the contractor more flexibility in scheduling, which for this project will feature complex sequencing and maintenance of operations.

“When you’re talking about $90 million you’re talking about considerable risk, and anything you can do to minimize risk would be supported by the ratepayer,” Jordan said.

Jordan showed the council a picture of equipment at the plant used for biosolids processing jerry-rigged to prevent leaks.

“As you know, big electrical equipment and leaks just don’t mix,” he said.

Contracts for the project will require frequent reporting by involved parties, to groups including the Portland Utility Board, the Citizens Utility Board and the City Council.

Management help sought for treatment plant work

Portland’s Bureau of Environmental Services is looking for program management and other support services as it embarks on major projects at its two wastewater treatment plants.

The Columbia Boulevard Wastewater Treatment Plant treats as many as 76 million gallons per day. Design for improvements is expected to begin next year.

The Tryon Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant treats an average of 6.5 million gallons per day. The facility was built in 1964 and expanded in 1976. An improvements program for the plant approved in 2014 includes five projects.

The overall project budget is $89 million. The program to expand secondary treatment in Portland is mandated by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.

The winning bidder will work as an extension of BES staff to assist project managers with completion of the two large projects, according to the request for proposals. The initial contract will run for five years with provisions allowing for a five-year extension.

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The city of Portland will fight a legal decision that its 2016 ban on fossil fuel terminals is unconstitutional.

The Portland City Council on Wednesday voted to appeal a July decision of the Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA) to strike down the city’s ban, which attempted to create a new land use category for fossil fuel terminals and limit their proliferation in Portland.

Commissioner Dan Saltzman said cities must fight harder these days to protect the environment because there’s no leadership on climate change in the White House.

“This is an appeal that needs to be taken forward,” he said.

The council passed the policy in January 2016, after dozens of interested residents packed City Hall to testify in favor. Then four parties, including the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council, appealed it to LUBA, which agreed that the city had unfairly affected interstate commerce by preventing petroleum from passing through city limits.

Willy Myers, executive director of the building trades council, is strongly against the city’s position. The law would hurt the entire state, he said in a note to the 91��Ƶ, because nearly all fossil fuels consumed in Oregon pass through Portland.

“Disallowing new infrastructure could create an energy bottleneck in meeting the needs of businesses and households across the state, lead to increased costs if supply is constrained and hamper economic growth,” he wrote.

Chief Deputy City Attorney Linly Rees said it’s unusual for the city to appeal a LUBA ruling, but in this case, the city attorney’s office believes there’s a reasonable basis for asking the Oregon Court of Appeals to reconsider. That’s partly because, in this case, two of three LUBA members recused themselves, leaving only one to issue the ruling.

At this point in Rees’ testimony to the City Council on Wednesday, Mayor Ted Wheeler cut in.

“I would like to add the hilarious footnote that that was referred to in the press as a ‘unanimous decision,’” he said, indicating air quotes. “They could have said ‘unilateral.’”

The council’s vote was unanimous, 5-0.

Commissioners were concerned the ruling could set a precedent impacting other ambitious policies intended to address climate change.

“It’s certainly possible that all three members of LUBA could get it wrong, from our point of view,” Commissioner Nick Fish said. “But I do think that what makes this case unique is that we’re talking about a fundamental constitutional question decided by a single member of LUBA which could in the future significantly limit our ability to move forward with climate-related legislation.”

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The city of Portland is close to adopting a comprehensive plan for ensuring its lofty equity goals are employed on all city construction projects, after years of contentious debate.

But Wednesday’s hearing at City Hall showed the fight isn’t over for the new Community Equity and Inclusion Plan (CEIP), which Mayor Ted Wheeler’s office is calling one of the ambitious equity policies ever undertaken in Portland.

Dissatisfaction from longtime stakeholders was still present, but given the issue’s rancorous history in Portland, Wheeler’s plan may be close to the finish line.

“I bet a lot of you thought I was going to get up here and say bad things about it,” said James Posey, a contractor and longtime voice in equitable contracting in Portland. “But I’m not.”

Posey and nearly all of the two dozen others who testified said more work on the policy is needed. They asked for accountability for contractors who fail to live up to terms, a fine greater than $2,000 for failure to meet goals, and better data to ensure contractors don’t play with numbers to make a white, male workforce appear more diverse on paper.

Wheeler’s CEIP didn’t arrive at the hearing requiring the union-friendly policy tool known as Community Benefits Agreements (CBAs) on all projects – owners of projects over $25 million that use alternative contract methods are given the choice. This led to many speakers saying they could not support the policy as written.

“I urge you to not support this,” said Connie Ashbrook, executive director emeritus of Oregon Tradeswomen Inc.

The CEIP is intended to standardize equity requirements and keep project owners from having to devise new plans for each project. Currently, several city bureaus have their own plans, as do certain large capital projects. The CEIP was compiled with the help of various bureaus and is intended to provide a consistent approach to equitable contracting.

One issue that’s vexed Portland leaders going back to former mayor Bud Clark in the early 1990s is how to draft a policy like the CEIP that will stand up to legal challenges. City attorneys have warned that CBAs might increase diversity on city projects, but would put the city in a risky position.

The most charged issue in this arena going back to Wheeler’s predecessor, Charlie Hales, has been how to incorporate the signatory component of CBAs. Many people who’ve testified to the council have said this component is crucial to ensuring the engagement of stakeholder groups. These include industry-focused nonprofits like Oregon Tradeswomen, Constructing Hope, Portland Youth Builders, and the Metropolitan Alliance for Workforce Equity.

These groups, along with neighborhood organizations like the East Portland Action Plan, and construction worker unions under the Columbia Pacific Building Trades Council have said the signatory requirement is critical because there needs to be a contractual relationship tying contractors to their promises.

“The problem with (the CEIP) is it doesn’t have any method of delivery for equity in workforce,” Willy Myers, executive director of the council, told the 91��Ƶ.

But contractors, including the heads of black-owned open-shop firms, and city project managers have expressed concerns about their obligations and the city’s enforcement ability.

The chief administrative officer under Charlie Hales, Fred Miller, was critical of CBAs. Miller retired at the end of last year. His successor, Tom Rinehart, along with the head of the Office of Equity and Human Rights, Dante James, have taken the lead devising the CEIP for Wheeler.

CBAs were used for two Portland Water Bureau projects, and not without controversy.

They were regarded as successful in achieving diverse worker and owner participation, but an independent report criticized several aspects of how they were used in the pilot projects, including project set-aside money going to things unrelated to the projects. The report, by Framework LLC, also said the CBAs were employed in ways that could provide the appearance of conflict of interest.

Miller said at the time he did not want “pure” CBAs used for the Portland Building reconstruction project, which his bureau was gearing up to take on.

Wheeler’s solution to address this dilemma is a CEIP-supporting document to be signed by contractors selected for city projects – a . It will effectively serve as the signatory document to the CEIP.

The scope of the partnership agreement is narrower than that of the CBAs piloted by the city. But Wheeler thinks it can achieve the right level of stakeholder engagement while keeping separate the contractual relationship between the city and its prime contractor.

The proposed fix is intended to allow both union and open-shop firms to compete for city projects, which for years has been a major sticking point in the conversation around equitable contracting. A number of local businesses belonging to the National Association of Minority Contractors are open shop, and some of their owners say it’s easier to hire from their communities absent unions. And they point out that unions haven’t always lived up to equity goals.

Commissioner Dan Saltzman introduced an amendment requiring CBAs for projects over $25 million. But because Saltzman introduced his amendment at the start of Wednesday’s hearing, no one in the room had prepared to address it. NAMC Oregon Executive Director Nate McCoy said he needed to check with people before publicly agreeing to support the amendment.

McCoy has said he favors an equity plan that allows all NAMC Oregon businesses to participate. He and national NAMC board member and Raimore Construction head Jeff Moreland sounded open to it on Wednesday.

“So, just to be clear,” Wheeler said, “with this amendment, we don’t lose you, Nate, and we get you, Willy?”

Seated at the same table, Myers and McCoy offered signs of assent to Wheeler’s question.

The CEIP would also establish a body – the Community Equity and Inclusion Committee – to oversee the city’s and its contractors’ performance. Not all of the CEIC’s formal duties have been assigned.

James, of the Office of Equity and Human Rights, said at the outset of the discussion that underlying all of Portland’s struggles to achieve diversity in contracting are racism and sexism.

“I want to be clear about this,” he said.

Wheeler’s office on Wednesday forwarded three resolutions relating to the CEIP. They will return to the City Council next month, when votes, including on the new amendments, will be taken.

“We have 30 days to figure this out,” Wheeler said.

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