Hubbell Homes, CCI agree to work on anti-wage theft efforts

After an impressive show of people power by CCI leaders, Hubbell Homes, one of the largest residential builders in central Iowa, said they will work with Iowa CCI to integrate anti-wage theft provisions and other worker protections into the company’s subcontractor agreements.

On August 30, a team of CCI leaders met with Rick Tollakson, president and CEO of Hubbell Homes, to negotiate a proposal for this company to adopt a policy that cracks down on wage theft and punishes unethical subcontractors that exploit their workers.

Iowa CCI members also won time at Hubbell Homes’ upcoming trade partners meeting to discuss the impacts and consequences of wage theft in our communities and businesses.

Some of the provisions from our proposal include:

•  Tacking on our policy language on subcontractor agreements with Hubbell Homes, so if a subcontractor does business with Hubbell Homes, they have to abide by our proposed wage responsibilities.

•  Ensure subcontractor’s compliance with federal, state and city wage laws, as well as OSHA health and safety standards with regard to its workers.

•  Commit subcontractor to be responsible timely payment of its workers, whether employees or sub-subcontractors.

•  Expressly state that the consequence for non-compliant subcontractors is termination of contract with Hubbell Homes

“We do want to collaborate with Iowa CCI and appreciate the importance of subcontractors paying their employees and their sub-subcontractors,” wrote Dan Cornelison, VP and legal counsel of Hubbell Homes in an e-mail to Iowa CCI organizing staff.

Iowa CCI heard of 5 cases of wage theft by subcontractors on Hubbell Homes projects. We deal with the individual subcontractors separately, but this time we also went up the power tree to demand those at the top to stop doing business with shady entities that steal wages from workers.

Stay tuned to hear more about our upcoming actions to end wage theft in Iowa!

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