BY JOHN J. BYCZKOWSKI
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Gray brick walls rise three stories out of the mud at St. Xavier High School in Finneytown. Masonry contractor Nick Weisbrod surveys his team's handiwork and moans, "We can't get brick."
His supplier is running behind, and he's waiting for an order that should have arrived Sept. 1.
Weisbrod Masonry has been in business since 1977, and these are the best times the company has ever seen. Business doubled in 1996, again in 1997 and again this year.
Business could be even better, but it's not the lack of brick holding Mr. Weisbrod's business back: If only there were more bricklayers. "We've turned down $3 million in work this year because I can't find the people," he said. "It's very difficult finding qualified craftsmen. Right now, it's a perfect opportunity for people who like to work hard to get into construction."
Construction is at historic levels in Cincinnati, with employment climbing to record heights and hundreds of jobs going begging. Through September, about $2 billion in new construction work was under way in Greater Cincinnati, according to F.W. Dodge Market Analysis Group. That's on top of $2.3 billion in work started in 1997.
Construction of commercial and industrial buildings is off 20 percent, but that's been more than made up by a 6.5 percent rise in residential construction and a more than doubling of "non-building" construction -- road work and projects without roofs, led by the $270 million Paul Brown Stadium downtown and the $150 million Kentucky Speedway in Warsaw.
The region's work force is benefiting as well. About 43,300 were employed in construction in September, up more than 6,000 from September 1995.
This level of activity has kept Clarence Munn of Georgetown, Ohio, busy. Mr. Munn, a bricklayer for 37 years, this year has worked at the airport, Drake Center, the Anderson Township library, a furniture store in Florence and now St. Xavier's $12.6 million addition. This current job will keep him busy until spring at least, he figures.
The business has known some slow times, he said, but "it's been better here the last four, five years -- better than it's ever been."
There's more work than bricklayers to do it. James Reid, business manager for the local unit of the International Union of Bricklayers & Allied Craftworkers, said he has enough work for 40 more bricklayers.
Manpower is so tight the non-union bricklayers are earning at or near union wages, he said. The union has 40 apprentices in training.
The shortage of workers doesn't seem to be hurting big projects such as Paul Brown Stadium. That site employs about 250 workers "and growing," project manager Dan Streyle of Getz Ventures said. There are carpenters who set forms for concrete, ironworkers for the concrete reinforcing and laborers to pour concrete.
Next year, when the basic structure of the stadium is mostly complete, employment will hit its peak of around 750, and a wider variety of trades will be employed, he said. The market for workers is "active" but "not maxed out," he said.
It's no surprise that jobs like the stadium don't have trouble finding workers. Such public projects are subject to prevailing-wage laws and pay the best.
Contractors say that when the commercial construction market heats up, non-union workers are hired first, because they're cheapest. Eventually, there's so much work that union craftsmen get hired.
Things have been so good in Cincinnati this year that the unions themselves are adding non-union workers. And pay for non-union construction workers has risen to the point where the pay difference is "decreasingly noticeable" from union work, said John E. Neyer, director of marketing for Al Neyer Inc. construction.
Left holding the bag is the lowest-paying non-union construction work: home building. Though no home builders say there are big delays in construction, subcontractors who deal in residential construction are hurting for workers.
Dennis Clark, vice president for Airtron Inc. in Erlanger, said his installers might make $10 an hour installing heating and air conditioning in new homes. Commercial work pays $15. The loss of workers to commercial construction "is a bleed on our entire industry," Mr. Clark said.
The shortage of workers "is undoubtedly the No. 1 topic of discussion" in home building, said Joe Halpin, purchasing manager for Drees Co. home builders, headquartered in Fort Mitchell.
Linda Moeves, of Moeves Plumbing Inc. in Fairfield, said the worker shortages cross all the trades.
"I could hire 25 more people tomorrow, and guarantee them 40, 50 hours a week at least through June," she said.
Steve Stille's requirement for hiring flooring installers is simple.
"If we hold a glass in front of their mouths and it fogs up, we'll hire them," said Mr. Stille, owner of JLG Flooring Co., a residential flooring contractor in Loveland.
"If you're looking for skilled workers, they don't exist." He said his company has turned away $5 million in work in the past three months, because he doesn't have the people to do the work. The Erlanger office of Dayton-based Airtron has tried a whole bag of tricks to find workers.
"I've been running ads out of town in Lexington and parts of Indiana, and we've been partly successful," Mr. Clark said.
The company advertises on the Internet, and "Installers and trainees needed" signs decorate Airtron trucks. Airtron pays employees "bounties" of up to $200 for finding friends to take jobs.
The worker shortage has forced construction firms to play catch-up, and fast. Ms. Moeves said her workers now receive health insurance, long-term and short-term disability coverage, a 401(k) retirement savings plan, life insurance and tuition for plumber's school.
She admits those benefits have been added just in the past few years. They're a necessity, she said, if her company and other contractors have any hope of attracting young people into these occupations.
Are construction firms having to look outside Cincinnati for workers? Several said they've run ads in a 100-mile radius of Cincinnati, with limited success. One contractor, however, said "importing workers" is a sensitive subject among contractors in Cincinnati, given what happened at Procter & Gamble Co.'s olestra plant in Winton Place.
In September 1997, an Immigration and Naturalization Service raid at the plant found 38 undocumented Mexicans working for Centin Corp. of Indianapolis, installing insulation at the plant. There have been several such raids in the recent past around the Tristate, and so contractors are nervous about discussing "importing workers."
George Vredeveld, an economist and director of the Greater Cincinnati Center for Economic Education at the University of Cincinnati, said construction employment is growing faster than the work force overall in the region.
To fill construction jobs, "we're going to have to either attract people from other occupations or import them," he said. With unemployment low and workers in short supply, importing workers from outside the area is the most likely solution, he said.
There are no projections for how many workers will be needed in construction in the future. The construction outlook for Cincinnati, however, looks strong through 1999.
Jerry Monahan, executive secretary of the Greater Cincinnati Building Trades Council, ticks off the projects: expansions at the airport by Comair and DHL, an expansion at Newport Steel, Paul Brown Stadium employment is peaking, more construction at the University of Cincinnati.
Mr. Monahan holds out hopes that talk of a new convention center and $700 million in work rebuilding Cincinnati schools will pan out.
If the industry fails to attract enough new workers, the shortage could become critical. Ms. Moeves, who is also head of the subcontractors' Associates Advisory Council for the Homebuilders Association of Greater Cincinnati, said the shortage isn't causing big problems today, but it could in five or 10 years.
"When today's workers get to be 50 or 60 years old," she said, "who's going to replace them?"
