Permit Reform Urged on Capitol Hill
An 18-year wait for a permit on a construction project sounds like a long time. But at least the Trans-West Express Transmission project was finally approved last month – and 700 IBEW members will soon be on the ground building its high voltage transmission lines across four states. But the Grain Belt Express, a proposed 800-mile project in the Midwest that IBEW members and project developers teamed together to support back in 2015 publicly, still awaits its go-ahead. The problem? Gaining the necessary approvals to build transmission lines is so tricky that projects that would employ thousands of IBEW members