Sircal Contracting owner Chris Hentges stood in the lobby of The LINC, the new Lincoln University/Jefferson City Parks and Recreation wellness center, last week, marveling at what he saw.
The smell of varnish on four spotless new basketball courts wafted into the lobby. One floor below, in a new locker room being built for the Lincoln University football team, the smell of sawdust, fresh paint and new concrete filled the air.
The first time he saw the site, it was just a rocky bluff.
"I thought, 'How's that going to fit there?'" Hentges said.
Jefferson City contractors like Hentges and Meyer Electric Vice President Craig Linhardt are worried, though, about a bill working its way through Missouri's General Assembly that could repeal Missouri's 58-year-old prevailing wage law, which requires construction workers on taxpayer-funded projects to be paid state-set minimum wages.
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Proponents of the law's repeal, including Gov.