When Louis King II visited Asheville, North Carolina last year, he was struck by the destruction he saw. Cars were stranded in creek beds. Hurricane Helene’s rains and winds had damaged and destroyed roads, businesses and homes.
“It was like something from a Mad Max movie,” he recalls.
King, who is president and CEO of the workforce training group Opportunities Industrialization Center, Inc. (OIC), knows a bit about what it takes to rebuild and replace infrastructure after a storm. For years, he’s run construction and trades training programs, first as the leader of OIC’s affiliate in Minneapolis, and now overseeing the effort nationally.
When a disaster occurs, or even when the government wants to tackle a regular infrastructure project, all taxpayers fund the work. Yet, when it comes doing the work, the opportunities are not equally distributed. Consider Mecklenburg County, NC, about 120 miles from Asheville, where nearly 70 percent of the construction workforce is White — even though White people make up 45.1 percent of the population — and about 10 percent of the construction workforce is Black, compared to 30.9 percent of the population.
In PA, more than 89 percent of members in trade unions are White, according to 2022 data from the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, yet White people make up about 74.1 percent of PA’s population. Only about seven percent are Black, even though Black people make up 12.3 percent of the population.
The national numbers are even more disparate for women, who, despite being half the population, comprise 10 percent of all construction workers.
King is trying to change those numbers. For more than 20 years, he’s run a job training program that has successfully diversified Minnesota’s construction workforce — especially on projects with taxpayer funding. Now, as he leads OIC nationwide, he’s bringing those same programs to North Carolina, Pennsylvania and the nation.
Building a diverse construction pipeline
OIC began in Philadelphia — North Philly, to be exact. Reverend and civil rights icon Leon Sullivan founded it as a job training program for Black workers who were being excluded from higher-wage careers, namely, union jobs. In 1964, Sullivan bought an abandoned jail for $1, and started workforce training there. His experiment took hold and quickly expanded nationwide. Today, OIC Philadelphia has training programs in smart energy, phlebotomy, clinical and administrative medical assisting, culinary arts and digital media, amongst other programs. They recently announced that they’re partnering with the Philadelphia Energy Authority on a $250,000 venture to expand their green jobs training program, with plans to expand statewide.
King first joined OIC 30 years after its founding as president and CEO of Summit Academy OIC in Minneapolis, one of the organization’s busiest chapters, training about 1,000 people per year. He came to the role after serving in the Army, working with various nonprofits, and serving on the Minneapolis school board, where he became passionate about helping young people find jobs that could help them earn living wages and support families.
He started Summit Academy OIC’s construction training programs in response to increased infrastructure spending under the Obama administration. These projects were taxpayer funded, and King felt the people working on them should be demographically representative of Minnesotans. In 2010, people of color made up only 3.2 percent of the state’s construction workforce.
King found one reason for the disparity: Minnesotans in construction and trades followed family members into the industries. It was White people hiring White people. He calls it the “Swanson, Swenson and Johnson” problem.
“If you don’t know anyone in that industry, you have no idea what the qualifications are, what the opportunities are, or what’s the path for getting there,” King says.
“We’re future-proofing the workforce and giving them the skills needed to transform their lives.” — Louis King II, OIC
So, like Sullivan decades before, he founded a free training program to help people gain the skills they need for these jobs. Students completed two 10-week terms — one where they learned general industry and field specific knowledge in the classroom, one where they completed hands-on training in fields like carpentry and electrical work. Then, he connected them with contractors who were working on taxpayer-funded projects. He obtained most of Summit’s funding from philanthropists, and some from government grants and federal student financial aid programs.
To make sure his work gained traction, King started talking with policymakers about equitable hiring practices for government-funded projects. He advocated for MN to make equity a priority during the building of the U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, through what he called the HIRE MN campaign.
It took several years, but his efforts worked. In 2009, just 114 people of color — about 6.4 percent of their workers — worked on MN Department of Transportation (MnDOT) projects. By 2012, that number more than doubled to 329. Today, about 14.3 percent of MN’s highway construction workforce is people of color.
“The United States government always prides itself and local and state governments also pride themselves on infrastructure investments, and these are meant to stimulate the economy and provide jobs. The question becomes, who gets those jobs?” King says. “We have to make America work for everybody.”
Building industry pipelines
King has seen participants in OIC’s Minnesota-based training programs go from working multiple low-wage jobs to building lucrative trade careers. OIC construction and trades grads have gone on to work on two major league stadium projects in the state: the Minnesota Twins’ Target Field and The Vikings’ U.S. Bank Stadium (where the Eagles won their first Super Bowl).
Thirty-seven percent of the workers on the Vikings stadium were people of color. Collectively, they earned $41 million from the project.
Bukwon Holland is a graduate of the carpentry program. In high school, Holland moved from Philly to the Minneapolis area, where he completed a non-OIC welding program but struggled to find jobs because of market changes around the recession in 2008. He worked a few odd jobs, including for a dry cleaner where he met King, a customer. King told him about OIC’s program and Holland enrolled in a carpentry training program in 2012.
Holland secured a carpentry job one week before completing the program. After working in the field for a number of years, he pivoted to recruiting for OIC’s training programs. Today, a number of Holland’s family members have completed OIC’s programs in Philly.
“Louis King has changed my life,” Holland says. “When you join any OIC program, you will get the support needed, you will get the skills needed to have a sustainable, gainful employment.”
Summit Academy OIC has since expanded its programming so it can help reach younger people and set them up for careers after graduation. They also host programs to help middle school students learn about careers in trades and STEM.
Eric Mahmoud, CEO of Harvest Best Academy in Minneapolis, likened the importance of offering students career education early on to how pro athletes start playing their sports in childhood. Jalen Hurts didn’t wait until college to start throwing a football. Why should students with other career paths wait till they’re graduating high school to think about their careers?
It’s a bit like what King first observed about the trades: People tended to follow family members into the jobs because they knew from an early age the paths to follow. Mahmoud, who is originally from Philly and a Dobbins grad, encouraged his son to go through a Summit training program.
“The earlier that we can expose our students, the better,” Mahmoud says. “I can say firsthand the impact that he’s had on closing the equity gap and exposing our students and adults to the different trades, getting their foot in the door.”
HIRE Pennsylvania?
King became president and CEO of OIC of America in 2022. And, given the organization’s history in Philadelphia, it was natural for him to consider bringing his expansion of OIC’s construction and trades workforce training programs back where OIC began. The workforce for Commonwealth construction projects is predominantly White — 88 of PennDOT’s workforce, for example, is White.
“We’re in a situation where the demographic shift is real and there’s opportunity,” King says.
King expects OIC’s free training programs will launch in PA in September, likely in Harrisburg, before expanding to OIC chapters in other parts of the state. (OIC also has chapters in Philadelphia, Norristown and West Chester.) The first, free training program will start with a class of 30. They’re preparing the curriculum now, but King expects they’ll be able to hold classes every 10 to 12 weeks, at four or five different sites around PA.
“When you join any OIC program, you will get the support needed, you will get the skills needed to have a sustainable, gainful employment.” — Bukwon Holland, OIC
He sees an acute need for programs like this in Philly where construction jobs are well-paying and poverty rates are high. On average, construction workers make $25.39 an hour. MIT’s Living Wage Calculator estimates that a single adult needs to earn $23.26 per hour to live comfortably in Philly. Philly’s poverty rate hovers around 20 percent, with 22.8 percent of residents living in poverty in 2023, per Pew Charitable Trusts data.
“We think we can do better,” King says. “If we do it right, we can help people transform their lives and improve their communities.”
Building a diverse workforce, despite anti-DEI efforts
President Donald Trump’s executive orders are already halting spending on infrastructure projects that got funding via Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act. Trump’s also attacking equitable hiring policies, like the hiring goals set by MnDOT and other state agencies, for projects with federal funding. It’s still unclear what effects this will have.
Workforce development programs like OIC’s create pipelines for the construction industry by training people for jobs, teaching trainees how to join unions, and helping connect them to contractors in need of workers. Yes, they try to help states meet their hiring goals for taxpayer-funded projects, but they also build relationships with contractors and unions who are looking for workers. Even if states or the federal government end diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives for their infrastructure projects, pipelines like the ones OIC is building will help people of color access these jobs.
This is important because completing a training program doesn’t automatically mean someone becomes a part of a trades union, which requires applying and going through a somewhat opaque process. That’s why OIC partners with union leaders to help their training program participants join and secure the jobs they’re interested in.
In Minneapolis, “the unions send people to us [for training] because they’re looking for members,” King says.
They’re working with Ryan Boyer, business manager of the Philadelphia Building Trades Council, and Samuel Staten Jr., business manager for Laborers’ International Union of North America – Local 332. This aligns with Boyer’s goals to make Philly’s unions more diverse. Before his tenure, local unions largely focused their recruitment efforts on White and immigrant communities in the suburbs.
Boyer is working to bring more recruitment efforts into Philadelphia proper, with a focus on reaching Black and Brown people. With the support of Mayor Parker, he’s partnered with the School District of Philadelphia’s career and technical education programs. For her part, Parker has formed a Construction and Development Roundtable to better work with business leaders to make the construction industry more diverse, amongst other goals like promoting sustainable development and increasing collaboration with the City.
That said, Philly already has a number of workforce development initiatives aimed at improving equity in construction. The Rebuild program has paid training programs in carpentry, masonry, plumbing and electrical work, amongst other things. The nonprofit Everybody Builds works with unions and training programs to ensure women and people of color have opportunities in the trades. The Economy League has worked towards advocating for greater diversity in the city’s trades. In Philly and other cities, OIC has partnered with some of these programs and brought them into their Sullivan Training Network, so that they can take advantage of the resources and relationships OIC has built to help set graduates up for securing their first jobs and building their careers.
To join OIC, a program must be credentialed, last 8 to 20 weeks, and be free to participants. Letting existing training programs join the network — in addition to running their own training programs — allows OIC to reach more people. A few Philly programs, like the training program run through Energy Coordinating Agency and those run through Uplift Solutions, are already partners. OIC is in the process of evaluating a handful of other programs.
King believes cities should invest in training people for these jobs because they are unlikely to be automated away. Nationwide, there’s a shortage of construction workers, and the industry is growing, especially in places like Philly, where we’re experiencing a building boom.
“The infrastructure will always be there; your needs for a plumber will always be there,” King says. What’s more, climate events will keep needs high. “We haven’t seen our last natural disaster. These things cost billions, hundreds of billions of dollars in damage. And the tragedy is that once the cameras go away, there’s still the cleanup, recovery and rebuild. We think that this is an opportunity for forgotten people in forgotten places to help folks rebuild their lives and communities.”
“We’re future-proofing the workforce and giving them the skills needed to transform their lives.”
Every Voice, Every Vote funds Philadelphia media and community organizations to expand access to civic news and information. The coalition is led by The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Lead support for Every Voice, Every Vote in 2024 and 2025 is provided by the William Penn Foundation with additional funding from The Lenfest Institute for Journalism, Comcast NBC Universal, The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Henry L. Kimelman Family Foundation, Judy and Peter Leone, Arctos Foundation, Wyncote Foundation, 25th Century Foundation, and Dolfinger-McMahon Foundation.
MORE ON THE PHILLY WORKFORCE FROM THE CITIZEN