Millennium Pipeline spanning Sullivan and Orange Counties, has been a major source of jobs for the past several months

NEW WINDSOR – Despite the current state of the economy with cutbacks in business becoming a daily occurrence, the building trades, for the most part, are doing well.

Todd Diorio, president of the Hudson Valley Building Trades Council and also Business Manager for Laborers Local 17, said there is ample work for most of the building trades.

“The Millennium Pipeline project has been a real economy boon to my members, the Operating Engineers and the Teamsters, and the UA (plumbers and steamfitters) – which is doing a lot of the welding on the pipes; we also have the Concord, which is going; the Harriman project with the toll booths; we have a lot of work at Stewart with the Port Authority,” he said. The unions have also been doing a lot of work at St. Luke’s Cornwall Hospital and Crystal Run Medical Center, Diorio said.

The mechanical and electrical trades are slow right now, but Diorio expects them to pick up as well in the not-too-distant future.