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.
Case 1:21-cv-01421-NGG Case MDL No. 3011 Document 1 25-6 Filed 03/17/21 Filed 06/24/21 Page 106 Page of 106 154 of PageID 154 #: 362 available alternative employment practice that has less disparate impact and serves the employer's legitimate needs, 42 USC §§ 2000e–2(k)(1)(A)(ii) and (C). 596. The 1991 amendments to 42 USC § 2000e-2 (Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964) is the same remedy the Percy Class sought in Case 73-cv-04279, was training and is seeking apprenticeship involving on-the-job-training (“OJT”) coupled with related classroom instruction under the National Apprenticeship of 1937 (“the Fitzgerald Act”). The members of the Percy Class are ready, willing and able to work. 597. The State has interfered and continues to obstruct as well as continues to fail to abide by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and specifically the 1991 amendment 42 USC § 2000e-2 and 42 USC § 2000d, and in breach of the conditions to contracts regarding funds from the United States of America, and of rights secured by the United States Constitution Amendments V, XIV, and 42 USC §§ 1981, 1983 and 1985. 598. The Alternative Employment Practice under the Fitzgerald Act of 1937 satisfies the requirement that the Alternative Employment Practice be in accordance with law as it existed on June 4, 1989 as set forth at 42 U.S.C. § 2000e–2(k)(1)(C). 599. The chain of funding begins with Federal congressional appropriation, then to the Executive Office of Budget & Management allocation, then to the Executive Cabinet Agencies, then to government agencies who distribute the funds, and finally to the local, state and federal agencies. The Defendant Government Agencies, Owners and Employers as stewards of the Federal Funding, are required to live up to the intent of the Civil Rights Act relating to the adoption of this Alternative Employment Practice. 600. The Alternative Employment Practice asserted here is covered under and is a part of workers’ compensation coverage empowering disadvantaged persons to gain skills to enter the workforce at a level of skill and training which will permit them to rapidly move towards journeyperson status. 601. The Alternative Employment Practice does not require government subsidies to pay for itself, it is paid for by savings generated by savings to workers’ compensation coverage managed and committed to on-the-job training, safety, technology education, risk management and loss control to reward the value of hard work. 602. Upgrading skills allows a disadvantaged person ready, willing and able to work, to compete based upon skill rather than the color of their skin or ethnicity, the vision of 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000(e)-2(a), is lawful affirmative-action and equal employment opportunity. Fewer young people are entering the skilled trades, Employers are struggling to find enough skilled workers to undertake the massive infrastructure projects which are sorely needed. With an expected workforce shortage of craft professionals and service members projected to leave the military over the next five years, it is the "Percy Program" as the Alternative Employment Practice. 106
Case 1:21-cv-01421-NGG Case MDL No. 3011 Document 1 25-6 Filed 03/17/21 Filed 06/24/21 Page 107 Page of 107 154 of PageID 154 #: 363 603. Workers’ compensation coverage is the framework for providing the Percy Program as an Alternative Employment Practice, providing the apprenticeship through safety, risk management in workers’ compensation coverage and enrolling the new workforce to work alongside existing journeypersons, will grow the depth of skilled workers whose ranks are being diminished through age and attrition. Disadvantaged persons ready, willing and able to work, are given an opportunity and Employers build a reliable workforce to complete contracts competently and profitably. This workers’ compensation-based program delivers diversity opportunities. The key is having broad work processes available for meaningful long-term opportunities. 604. Workers’ compensation insurance is a required part of all employment and is an ideal mechanism within which to fit OJT apprentice training so as to foster equal employment opportunity. 605. The Percy Program as an Alternative Employment Practice can be funded by savings in workers’ compensation costs resulting loss control and safety training, and safe work habits without costing Owners or Employers or diverting any of the funding for the public work facilities. This is accomplished by simply applying savings resulting from reduced losses due to the Percy Program and allocating those savings to pay for apprenticeship out of the premium paid for workers’ compensation coverage. 606. The apprenticeship program portion of the Percy Program as the Alternative Employment Practice is ideally suited to train and create jobs for the Class as identified by Judge Lasker in Percy v. Brennan. The Apprentice Program as the Alternative Employment Practice is an outgrowth of a commitment to minimize loss and risk in the workplace by educating and training apprentices and journeypersons on safe and healthful practices, workers’ safety is impacted in a positive manner resulting in greater control of risk reducing loss for Employers and their carriers. 607. Written assessment and performance verification will implement career pathways created and endorsed by both industry and education, perfect for service members with construction training and/or experience who are interested in taking the assessments. 608. The most beneficial and constitutionally correct solution that is certainly a less onerous alternative to address and correct the inequity and foster equal employment is for the Owners to require that the Employers provide paid OJT and continuing education for those ready, willing and able to work. Defendant Owner Operators have Violated and Continue to Violate 42 U.S.C. §2000e–2(k)(1)(A)(ii) and 2(k)(1)(C) 609. The Defendant Employers have used unlawful employment practices of discrimination on grounds that the Plaintiff is able to meet its burden of production and persuasion proving that there was a less discriminatory alternative method of employment practice 107
