I am preparing to introduce legislation to clarify how prevailing wage requirements will be applied to broadband infrastructure development projects.
 
Although federal broadband development dollars have the potential to connect large numbers of Pennsylvanians in rural areas to high-speed broadband internet service, the Department of Labor and Industry (L&I) has enforced the Prevailing Wage Act in a manner that will reduce the impact of these federal dollars.
 
It is critical that we use these federal dollars to maximize the buildout of our broadband infrastructure.  Not only will this mean improved access to the commercial, educational and government services we typically think of when discussing this issue, it will also mean improving the access of rural Pennsylvanians to vital healthcare services. 
 
The very nature of rural healthcare means that patients and providers are long distances apart, and high-speed internet access for rural patients will enable them to receive reliable communication and monitoring services when patients have chronic conditions or unreliable access to transportation.  Although many health care providers have access to high-speed internet, the connection needs to go two ways.  In areas where there are significant shortages of healthcare professionals, patients with reliable high-speed internet services will be able to receive more of the medical services that many in more populated parts of Pennsylvania take for granted.
 
Given what is at stake, it is important to understand how L&I’s approach will lead to less broadband development.  Broadband infrastructure is inherently different from electric line construction, but L&I has refused a request to create teledata-specific job classifications and wage rates for the work that is involved in broadband infrastructure construction- and they are instead relying on the ‘electric lineman’ classification to classify many of the key workers on these broadband infrastructure projects.
 
Electric linemen do highly skilled and potentially dangerous work – and they are paid accordingly – but when their wage rates are applied inappropriately to teledata workers, it means that labor costs on broadband infrastructure projects will be artificially inflated.  Ultimately, this means that fewer Pennsylvanians will gain access to high-speed broadband internet through the federal funding allocated to Pennsylvania. 
 
To be clear, this legislation will not exempt these projects from prevailing wage requirements.  My bill will simply clarify that L&I will create teledata-specific job classifications for broadband development projects funded through the PA Broadband Development Authority – so that workers on these projects can be paid prevailing minimum wages based on the work that they actually do.
 
Please join me as a cosponsor if you share my priority of ensuring that we can use these federal dollars to connect more rural Pennsylvanians to high-speed broadband internet.