The Percy Program

It is a fight to level the playing field to be able to compete for jobs and careers on the basis of skills and make available apprentice training to all. In 1973 Al Percy launched a class action lawsuit to give workers like him a chance to better their lot in life. It would also ensure the availability of skilled workers to build the infrastructure of the future.

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3 years ago

Percy Action

good jobs while enjoying

good jobs while enjoying the pride that comes from building and maintaining critical infrastructure. Despite a favorable ruling, the apprenticeship never materialized and today the United States of America faces a shortage of skilled labor and unacceptable income disparity, low wages, few fringe benefits, minimal levels of training, and the lack of a career ladder, all contributing to a chronic workforce shortage. If the apprenticeship promised 47 years ago had occurred, people who need jobs today would have rewarding and good paying jobs. Percy was hoping to train the next generation of workers. The Associated Builders and Contractors has stated that the industry is in need of half a million workers today and even more in the future. They further note the need to expand upon current apprenticeship methods that have left us with a worker shortage. 150. Percy and the Percy Class are intended beneficiaries of the contracts and Federal Funding described herein, as provided for by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 49 CFR 21, 49 CFR 23, and 49 CFR 26, as well as EO 11246. The wrongful and improper violation of the law by the Defendant Government Agencies, Owners and Employers create barriers which cannot be allowed to continue when the real and ultimate result is permanent irreparable serious damage to a class protected as intended beneficiaries under contracts. 151. Percy as a member of the Class is a proper representative of the Class. His personal and business interests and the claims hereinafter set forth are fully aligned with those of the Class. 152. In the Memorandum Decision on November 8, 1974 in Percy v. Brennan, Judge Lasker addressed the plight of the Percy Class. The Percy Class was defined by Judge Lasker as “all black and Spanish-surnamed persons who are capable of performing, or capable of learning to perform, construction work, and who wish to perform construction . . . .”, and that is Plaintiff Percy Class and Percy is the Class representative. The standing was certified in Percy v. Brennan. 38

XI. The Advocates ALTERNATIVE EMPLOYMENT PRACTICE 153. Carl Evans with Irving Hurdle, Webster Gillory, Walter Fauntroy, Roger Edmunds, Anthony Robinson, and Lynette Barnhardt, along with James M. Kernan as Percy’s counsel (referred to hereinafter as the “Advocates”), comprise a team which sought unsuccessfully to have the Defendant Government Agencies and Owners require the Percy Class be employed under an Alternative Employment Practice at the facilities listed as Tag- Along cases at paragraph 235 - 238 of this Complaint. The members of the Percy Class are ready, willing and able to work, all to no avail because the Defendant Government Agencies, Owners and Employers have denied the Percy Class, frustrating the Alternative Employment Practice, failing to enforce EO 11246 and the mandates of the 1964 Civil Rights Act 42 U.S.C. §2000(e) and §2000(d) (1964) (the “Civil Rights Act”). The Civil Rights Act and EO 11246 are material conditions of contracts, as important an element of the contracts as providing steel for a bridge. The purpose of this litigation is not related to goals for minority employment inclusion. Instead there is a fundamental responsibility on the part of the Government Agencies, Owners and their agents to enforce the provisions of the Civil Rights Act and EO 11246 for the benefit of the Percy Class as third-party beneficiaries, incorporated into agreements as conditions to in contracts. 154. The Advocates when explaining the Alternative Employment Practice as hereinafter detailed, presented statistics that lower socioeconomic communities such as the Percy Class face disproportionate negative exposure to market conditions that result from a long-term and discernible lack of fair and equal access to the skills and markets that result in employment. Coincidentally, disproportionate number of blacks among the disenfranchised remains a huge racial justice problem that has existed for the multiple generations separating African Americans in the United States. The Class from disadvantaged neighborhoods have been continually kept of of the major trades, which is not just a relic of past discriminatory practices, but the continuation of present-day conspiracy of separation and consistent poverty that leads to major health concerns and quality of life issues. 39

Alternative Employment Practice Percy Program