Labor council picket of The Reactory development enters fifth month
Photo | Grant Welker
Galaxy Life Sciences is building a biomanufacturing facility off Belmont and Plantation streets in Worcester.
In the summer of 2020, Webster developer Galaxy Life Sciences announced plans to build a $50-million biomanufacturing facility at Worcester’s 46-acre life sciences campus, The Reactory.
In the announcement, Worcester Business Development Corp. CEO Craig Blais said, “The Reactory substantially increases the city’s tax base and most importantly creates a wide range of jobs in the region.”
Now, as the project nears its 2022 completion date, local worker advocates are saying Galaxy has not offered fair opportunity to local workers, as it once promised.
“Local contractors are not getting the opportunity to work on these projects,” said Jorge Rivera, president of the Worcester-Fitchburg Building Trades Council, which has had members picketing outside Galaxy’s site on Belmont Street since September. “We feel as though the area standards for the local area are diminishing because of it. We want to make sure that whoever it is – public or private – that developers maintain the areas.”
Matt Zicaro, vice president of real estate development for Galaxy, said in a statement two of the three contracts awarded for Galaxy’s project have been local. The companies involved are Worcester-based A.F. Amorello & Sons Inc., Dauphinais Concrete, Inc., which is located in Douglas and Bellingham, and New Hampshire concrete contractor Form-Up Foundations.
He added 75 cents of every dollar spent on the project has gone to local communities and local union labor.
The council has been in talks with Galaxy since The Reactory project was first pitched. Rivera said Galaxy originally said it would self-perform much of the construction, but would offer bidding opportunities for local contractors.
“The opportunities never came,” he said. “The steel erection came, the concrete came, and none of our contractors got a chance and opportunity to throw in any numbers to bid on the project.”
The project is slated to be completed this year, but Rivera said there are still plenty of opportunities to work with the council on providing bids.
“Just because you put up the steel and the concrete, that doesn’t mean that construction is done,” said Rivera. “We’ve been out there for a while, just in hopes that we can stay engaged and continue a conversation.”
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