In New York, where a public contractor does not pay the required prevailing wages, workers can bring lawsuits for those wages as “third party beneficiaries” of those public contracts. Workers can do this because the Labor Law requires public works contracts to say that prevailing wages must be paid. But what if that contract language is missing, or if the contractor inserts language denying that prevailing wages are due?

In an appeal brought by MSR, the New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, has ruled that contactors can’t dodge their obligation to pay prevailing wages just because they don’t include the correct language in the public works contract. The court also ruled that contractors can’t put language in the contracts that shorten the six-year statute of limitations to bring a prevailing wage lawsuit. This is a landmark ruling that will both protect workers’ right to get their prevailing wages, and also protect union contractors from unscrupulous non-union ones that try to undercut their unionized competitors by breaking the prevailing wage law.

Many thanks to the New York Council of Carpenters, the Greater New York and New York State Building Construction and Trades Councils, AFL-CIO, and the Elevator Constructors, Local 1 who filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of the workers in this case. MSR Partner Jason Rozger litigated and argued this case before the Court of Appeals.