One of the biggest redevelopment projects in Jersey City has just been slapped with a trio to Stop Work orders as contractors working on The Journal have been cited for unpaid wages and other violations.
Earlier this week, the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development (NJDOL) issued three Stop Work Orders against multiple contractors at The Journal, formerly known as One Journal Square. The massive development, being built by Kushner Companies, has been under construction for several years.
The NJDOL cited three companies working on the project for the violations. MJQ Drywall, 506 Painting, and Exxon Development were flagged for issues including worker misclassification, unpaid or late wages, overtime rate violations, and not providing proper earned sick leave for workers.
“Exploitation in Jersey City is the direct result of the political elite selling out the community and workers to billionaire developers like the Kushner family,” said Michael Hellstrom, Vice President and Eastern Regional Manager of the Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA). “Charles Kushner and [Jersey City Mayor] Steven Fulop are following their ambitions for high profile political positions, while workers are left with the consequences of careless Jersey City development.”
The development of “The Journal” was the subject of intense litigation between Kushner Companies and the Jersey City Redevelopment Authority that began in 2018. The company has initially accused Jersey City of “anti-Trump bias” in a lawsuit for denying the project a tax abatement.
The parties eventually settled the suit in 2020, with the tax abatement being denied and Kushner making a $2.5 million investment in local arts initiatives. The lot, which sits next to the Journal Square PATH station, sat vacant for almost a decade because of the drama.
While the 1,723-unit development represents over $1 billion in investment, LIUNA says that wage theft at The Journal development site is part of a troubling pattern. The union says that dozens of concrete workers reported working last year on the project for weeks without pay.
LIUNA has helped over 70 workers file formal claims with the NJDOL over those issues, with that case ongoing. The union also claims that workers on The Journal alleged that when NJDOL investigators visited the job sites, company foremen and supervisors lied to the workers, falsely telling them that the NJDOL investigators were agents from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement to try to dissuade workers from speaking with investigators.
“We are grateful to do this work in New Jersey because we know the state of New Jersey and the excellent folks over at the Department of Labor, have working peoples’ backs — even when developers like Kushner Companies and general contractors like AJD can’t be trusted to follow the law on their jobsites,” said Hellstrom.
The Journal is slated to begin pre-leasing soon and is currently offering up to two months of rent free as part a limited deal on their website. Target has leased the project’s 40,000 square feet of ground-floor retail, although Kushner has not announced a potential opening date for the store yet.
