A Local Hire Ordinance passed unanimously by the Birmingham, Alabama City Council in January is a perfect example of leveraging public goods for the most public good.
Taxpayer dollars are funding the return of manufacturing to the United States through the $4 trillion coming down from Biden-era industrial policy, presenting the opportunity to leverage this public funding to ensure good for the most people. By ensuring funds are invested in high-road jobs, Birmingham policy makers and employers will promote economic stability, rather than a low-road alternative of high poverty despite low unemployment.
As part of this Local Hire Ordinance, contractors working on projects exceeding $3 million must hire 30% local labor, keeping dollars within the local economy. The ordinance incentivizes employing apprentices enrolled in state- and federally-approved training programs, and contractors are encouraged to collaborate with local workforce programs that target historically disadvantaged groups, ensuring that opportunities reach underrepresented communities. Over time, these provisions will build a higher-skilled, more self-sufficient workforce and address the labor market conditions leaving some communities behind.
Local Opportunities Coalition and Jobs to Move America (JMA) were instrumental in developing the policy tools communities may use to create local economic empowerment through public funds. And in contrast to too many toothless provisions, the Birmingham ordinance includes accountability measures for outcomes transparency and disqualification for future city contracts for failure to comply. Compliance language means that once a contractor has made promises, they will make good faith efforts to actually keep those promises.
In the face of an unstable national economy and rising cost of living, the city of Birmingham is making strides toward taking control of its own economic future. Contractors will now engage community stakeholders in creating Local Hiring Plans that proactively address past disparities in access to economic opportunity.
We encourage cities nationwide to emulate this model—the Local Opportunities Coalition stands ready to assist. Our coalition offers policy expertise, strategic guidance, and community partnerships to support the development of equitable hiring plans that drive sustainable economic growth.
Today, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)’s updates to the Uniform Grants Guidance released on April 4, 2024 officially go into effect. These are some of the most substantial changes to the Uniform Grants Guidance—which determines how states, localities, tribal governments, and other federal grantees can spend federal money—in decades.
A coalition of national and regional advocacy groups, labor unions, and community organizations, known as the Local Opportunities Coalition, for years led the efforts to advocate for updates to these federal grant guidelines and on April 4, 2024 the White House’s OMB announced the revisions to the Uniform Grants Guidance. These revisions include many of the coalition’s recommendations, which marks a historic step in transforming how communities can use the trillions in federal funds flowing to states and cities.
The updates allow grantees to attach job quality, racial and gender equity incentives, and encourage private contractors to uplift local economies in public contracts. Some of the significant revisions in the updated Uniform Grants Guidance include:
Removing the ban on geographic preference so states and cities can prioritize workers and small businesses in their communities
Allowing recipients of federal funds to advance family-sustaining jobs by rewarding bidders for job quality metrics such as wages and benefits, which can include implementing scoring mechanisms like Jobs to Move America’s U.S. Employment Plan
Allowing for hiring efforts targeted to disadvantaged communities, including workers of color and women, to advance equity and access to quality jobs
Requiring federal grantees to conduct cost-benefit analyses before contracting out public services to private firms
Encouraging federal grantees to purchase goods and services from private contractors that emphasize environmentally sustainable practices and products
Now, local and state governments will have the ability to advance good jobs, equity, and community benefits in the public procurement process for federally-funded projects. We look forward to seeing how these changes will further maximize outcomes and benefits for communities, workers, and small businesses.
The U.S. Department of Labor published a blog about the OMB’s recent updates to the Uniform Grants Guidance, highlighting many of the updates the Local Opportunities Coalition advocated to include. Read the blog here.
Federal News Network’s Eric White spoke on the Federal Drive with Tom Temin with the assistant director for policy at Jobs to Move America, Valerie Lizarraga, about the Office of Management and Budget (OMB)’s updates to the Uniform Grants Guidance. Listen to the interview here.
Jobs to Move America and Rutgers’ School of Management and Labor Relations hosted a webinar on how to use the recent changes to the OMB’s Uniform Guidance to make federal funds work for communities and workers. Watch it below.
