Carpenters union members at Thursday’s protest. A giant, inflatable fat cat made an appearance in New Haven on Thursday, outside of a Wooster Square construction site where carpenters union leaders spoke out about a subcontractor’s history of misclassifying employees as independent contracto rs. The cat joined around a dozen representatives and members of the carpenters union outside of 20 and 34 Fair St. The union, known as North Atlantic States Regional Council of Carpenters Local 326, gathered to call on a developer to not contract with subcontractors who misclassify their employees as independent contractors — and for the state legislature to pass legislation cracking down on other employers who do the same. “We’re here informing the public, exposing bad actors,” said union organizer and Business Representative Ardemar Torres, who has been a member of the union for 21 years. Union members said that, for the last two months, they have been demonstrating outside of the Fair Street construction zone. The two properties are owned by a holding company controlled by the Norwalk-based Spinnaker Real Estate Partners, which is partnering with Darren Seid of the New York City-based development firm Epimoni on plans to construct a new six-story, 168-unit apartment complex at that site. The development will also create a “greenway” on Fair Street — a publicly accessible walkable connection that will reopen for the first time in years a stretch of Fair between Union and Olive Streets. The building represents just some of the hundreds of new apartments that have popped up in recent years on the downtown edge of Wooster Square. On Thursday, union members and leadership pointed to the fact that Spinnaker’s construction arm, Halyard Building Company, subcontracts its work on the lot with a Danbury-based company called Fernando JJ Carpentry LLC. Fernando JJ Carpentry LLC received a Stop-Work Order from the state Department of Labor’s Wage Workplace Standards Division on Sept. 15, 2025. “The above-referenced Employer is hereby ORDERED TO CEASE ALL BUSINESS OPERATIONS FOR THIS WORKSITE based on the following violation(s),” the order reads. Two boxes were ticked: misrepresenting employees as independent contractors, and materially understating or concealing payroll. A state Department of Labor spokesperson told the Independent on Friday that Fernando JJ Carpentry LLC was released from that Stop-Work Order on Oct. 21, 2025. Click here to read the order in full. Representatives from Fernando JJ Carpentry LLC and Spinnaker did not respond to requests for comment by the publication time of this article. Meanwhile, construction in progress. An employee is typically considered to be someone who works for someone else, is not able to decide how and when work is performed, has an indefinite relationship with their employer, and is assigned work by their employer. An independent contractor has more control over their work and typically has a temporary relationship with an employer until a project is complete. Misrepresenting employees as independent contractors allows companies to get around paying workers’ compensation, insurance, and payroll taxes. That leaves the tax burden on the employee. Lower labor costs for companies also means that they can take bids at lower prices than competitors. The union estimates around 20 carpenters were working for Fernando JJ Carpentry LLC at the time of the issuance of the Stop-Work Order last September. “You pay all the things that an employer would pay” when you are classified as an independent contractor but are actually an employee, said Marc Okun, the union’s Connecticut regional manager. Okun has been a union member for more than two decades. “They’re preying on people who simply don’t understand” the tax system. Torres said that while Fernando JJ Carpentry LLC is now in compliance with the Department of Labor, there’s no guarantee that it will remain that way. That’s why the union is pushing for the Connecticut legislature to pass laws targeting payroll fraud. Last legislative session, the legislature passed a bill allowing for the hiring of 13 new investigators for the Department of Labor. “That’s a good thing,” said Torres. They want to keep building on that. Apprentice Zach Bjornberg and journeyman Davon McNeil stood behind a sign reading “SHAME ON SPINNAKER REAL ESTATE PARTNERS” at Thursday’s protest. “It’s infuriating, honestly,” said Bjornberg. “These workers are getting taken advantage of.” He said that while many workers know that they’re being taken advantage of, they have no choice — they have to pay their bills. McNeil, who said he lives in New Haven County, said that he has been coming out often for the last two months to demonstrate. As a union, he said, their goal is to “make equal,” and that employers should “do right by the people who are working for you.” Thursday was 22-year-old Alicia Turton’s first union demonstration. “This is something I’m passionate about,” she said. Her first day of work as a carpenter is on Monday. “I’m very excited.” Turton said that she has always done little carpentry projects for herself, like redoing tile floors, and she finally received her Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) certification and completed a pre-apprenticeship program. When Turton was younger, she said that she thought she wanted to play basketball. Then, she wanted to be a civil engineer. Finally she realized she was more passionate about doing manual labor rather than working with blueprints and computers. “I want something that’s so valuable, that no one can take from me,” she said. Turton: First union protest. Union leaders Torres and Okun. Ana Cardona, an organizer and business representative for the union, said that she lived in Fair Haven for more than 20 years before moving to Litchfield. “I worked in a lot of these residentials, and I couldn’t live in them.” The post Carpenters Drill Pro-Labor Message appeared first on New Haven Independent. ...read more read less