CHSRA Celebrates 10-Year Partnership with Construction Trades

Rendering Courtesy of CHSRA

In celebration of Labor Day, the California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) recognizes 10 years of collaborative partnership with the men and women of the skilled craft unions “diligently working to bring the first electrified high-speed rail system to the U.S.”

According to CHSRA, this partnership is possible thanks in part to the establishment of the Authority’s Community Benefits Agreement, signed and executed in 2012, that “promotes employment and business opportunities during construction while advancing training opportunities to targeted and disadvantaged workers.”

According to CHSRA, high-speed rail construction and labor jobs by the numbers include the following:

• 11,474 jobs created (as of July 31, 2023).
• 1,359 average daily site workers (as of June 2023).
• 3,808 jobs going to residents from Fresno County.
• 2,141 from Kern County.
• 1,127 from Tulare County.
• 498 from Madera County.
• 392 from Kings County.
• 42 completed high-speed rail structures to date.
• 27 active construction sites.

CHSRA’s Community Benefits Agreement, the Authority says, has helped create thousands of good-paying union jobs to date, with more than 1,300 skilled workers dispatched to a high-speed rail construction site each day. Nearly 75% of the jobs created on the project go directly to individuals from disadvantaged communities. The agreement applies to current and future construction segments of the 500-mile Los Angeles to San Francisco project.

“Since the Community Benefits Agreement, this project has created more than 11,000 well-paying construction jobs in the Central Valley, with more than 70% of the workers residing in the Central Valley,” said CHSRA CEO Brian Kelly. “Moreover, we worked closely with the Fresno Economic Development Corporation and the trades to expand workforce training to the men and women of the Central Valley looking to work in the construction industry.”

“We would like to thank the Authority and the Authority’s CEO Brian Kelly for providing tremendous opportunity for the members of our building trades unions to work on such a monumental project transforming transportation infrastructure and communities in California,” said Chris Hannan, President of the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California. “We look forward to continuing our work with the Authority and our affiliates to build out our nation’s first high-speed rail system in California.”

CHSRA has begun work to extend the 119 miles under construction to 171 miles of future electrified high-speed rail from Merced to Bakersfield, Calif. CHSRA has also environmentally cleared 422 miles of the high-speed rail program from the Bay Area to the Los Angeles Basin.