Support Builds for a Pay Raise for Janitors

By SCOTT GOLDSTEIN
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Published: December 12, 2005

Statehouse

Private contractors that win bids to clean state-government buildings would be forced to more than double the pay of their janitors and offer them health benefits under proposed legislation that has strong support in the Legislature.

The 500 or so janitors employed by state contractors are part-time workers who are currently paid as little as $6.15 an hour, according to Local 32BJ of the Service Employees International Union. Their pay would rise to the prevailing wage set by the U.S. Department of Labor, about $13.15 an hour, under companion bills A4161 and S2702 that are moving through committees in both houses. Health benefits would add another $2.87 per hour per worker, according to advocates of the bills. But it is unclear whether janitors, who are largely part-time workers, would amass enough hours to qualify for significant benefits.

The bill applies to companies that do janitorial work at state-owned or state-leased properties, including state agencies, such as the Motor Vehicle Commission, NJ Transit stations and state universities.

New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, California and the federal government currently have prevailing wage laws for janitors. “A lot of these people are trying to support families,” says Senator Joseph V. Doria Jr. (D-Hudson), co-sponsor of the Senate bill, which the Labor Committee unanimously approved two weeks ago and sent to the Budget and Appropriations Committee. The Assembly Labor Committee passed a companion version last June and sent it to the Appropriations Committee, where it still awaits action.

Security guards and janitors in the public and private sectors make an average of $21,000 a year, or about half of what it takes to rent a two-bedroom apartment, says Susan J. Bottino, a policy analyst for New Jersey Policy Perspective, a think tank in Trenton. “Workers for the state may earn as little as $12,792 at current minimum wage of $6.15 per hour,” Bottino says. “This bill will allow the state to take the high road when considering bids for these services.”

Under current law, the state is required to award cleaning contracts to the lowest bidder, leaving state-contracted janitors with significantly lower wages, says Kevin Brown, district chairman of the service employees union.

“This means that contractors who do business responsibly, by paying living wages and decent benefits can’t compete for state work,” Brown says. “They are immediately out of the running because they can’t bid as low as a contractor that pays low wages and no benefits.”

The measure has received little public opposition from the dozens of private contractors who do janitorial work for the state. “As long as the bidding is apples to apples, it will be fair,” says Joseph A. Manfredo, president of All Clean Building Services in Lawrenceville, which has $5 million worth of contracts to clean state-owned buildings. “In fact, if it has any kind of effect, it will be positive for me because the value of the contracts will rise and my profit will rise.”

All Clean adds a 12% profit and overhead charge to its bids for contracts. “It’s good for me,” Manfredo says of the push to pay the prevailing wage. “Is it good for the state? I don’t know.” The union says the increased cost to the state would be offset by savings on public-health programs and other programs the workers currently qualify for because of their low pay.

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