WA Data Center Work Group Recommendations Leave Workers Behind
The Data Center Workgroup initiated by Governor Bob Ferguson’s Executive Order 25-05 culminated with a vote on recommendations Friday. Climate Jobs Washington, alongside labor leaders and local community electeds, issued a sharp condemnation of the growing opposition to data center construction warning that some of the state’s largest champions for climate action are now the primary roadblocks to economic stability and a realistic clean energy future. The coalition argues that by blocking these projects, opponents are choking out one of the only consistent sources of family-wage union construction jobs and distracting from the state’s actual energy crisis: a failure to build enough clean generation, storage, and transmission.
This opposition, led by the same groups who stood beside labor while passing our state’s ambitious climate laws, is now creating a dangerous lose-lose scenario for Washington workers and families. The state is not only losing hundreds of good-paying jobs, but, in many cases, it is also pushing these projects to other states with weaker or no labor protections, lower safety standards, and a significantly lower standard of environmental protections.
“Construction jobs are the canary in the coal mine for our entire economy. When they decline, it’s a bad sign for everyone,” said Heather Kurtenbach, Executive Secretary of the Washington State Building and Construction Trades Council. “Right now, data centers built under Project Labor Agreements are one of the only consistent sources of family-wage construction jobs in our state. To block them without a realistic plan to replace those jobs is to pull the rug out from under thousands of working families and threaten the economic stability of our communities.”
“WA is not taking seriously the just transition promised to workers in the implementation of our clean energy laws. We are stuck in a dangerous loop, solving for the wrong problem,” said Cassie Bordelon, Executive Director of Climate Jobs Washington. “The issue isn't data centers; the issue is our collective failure to build our own clean energy generation and transmission to meet our needs. This is allowing the anti-worker, anti-climate policies championed by figures like Donald Trump to take hold in Washington state. By failing to act, the state is effectively choosing to export its jobs and its environmental responsibilities at the expense of working people.”
“If adopted as written,these recommendations threaten the economic vitality of the Valley at a time when jobs are fewer and farther between. This puts our community members in a bind- can they feed their families or do they need to leave Central WA to find work elsewhere? Matthew Hepner, East Wenatchee City Council, Position 7. It’s time to ask the opponents of these projects a direct question: What is your vision? Because a future where we build nothing, in which we sacrifice the well-being of working people, does not work for Washingtonians, our families, or our communities.”
This is a solvable problem. We can both address our clean energy short fall by building clean energy infrastructure in our state and responsibly site data centers instead of driving them out completely.
Climate Jobs Washington is calling for a pragmatic, pro-worker approach that addresses the root causes of our energy challenges. The coalition demands that state leaders and environmental groups stop scapegoating individual projects and focus on the urgent task of building a robust, reliable, and clean energy grid that can support both our climate goals and our economy.