WHEREAS, On March 6, 2015, the U.S Department of Transportation announced a pilot program that will enable Federal Transit Administration (FTA) and Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) grantees to utilize social and/or economic contracting requirements in order to evaluate impacts on the competitive bidding process. The pilot program will focus on local labor/geographic-based labor hiring preferences, economic-based labor hiring preferences, and labor hiring preferences for veterans; and
WHEREAS, The goals of the pilot program are to make it easier for states and cities to promote the use of local residents for transportation projects and to test and evaluate the merits of local hire provisions that were traditionally prohibited by federal contracting rules due to concerns about adverse impacts on competition; and
WHEREAS, In Philadelphia, there is a Hyundai Rotem USA train manufacturing facility that involved an investment of thirty million of dollars ($30,000,000) that provided at its peak three hundred and fifty (350) workers with family-sustaining jobs, as well as five thousand (5,000) jobs for Pennsylvanians through contracts with suppliers throughout the Commonwealth; and
WHEREAS, Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) has issued a one hundred and ninety million dollars ($190,000,000) Request For Proposals (RFP) for fifty-five (55) trains; and
WHEREAS, SEPTA receives much public funding from Pennsylvania residents and it is a missed opportunity for such public investment to be returned to local residents and the local economy if the result of its procurement processes is for those funds to go to contractors benefiting local economies outside Pennsylvania if there is no local preference; and
WHEREAS, That situation is illustrative of the benefits and importance of a State Local Preference to benefiting local residents and economies throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the state economy itself; and
WHEREAS, Other states and local governments have enacted local preferences, thus, disadvantaging Pennsylvanians in competitive procurement processes; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF CITY OF PHILADELPHIA, That it hereby urges The Pennsylvania General Assembly to legislate a State Local Preference for contracting processes involving entities using state and local government funds.
David Oh
Councilman At- Large
January 28, 2016