New York Expands Prevailing Wage Yet Again: What You Need To Know And When You Need To Know It

In recent years, New York State has steadily expanded the scope and administrative burden of prevailing wage compliance. What was once limited to traditional public works has now crept into private projects receiving public benefits, hauling operations, renewable energy projects, and—most recently—offsite fabrication and concrete and asphalt trucking. Contractors and subcontractors should understand that these changes are not academic. They carry real pricing, payroll, registration, and audit risks, particularly for those operating in or around New York City and its surrounding counties.

Contractors may recall that in 2022 Governor Hochul signed legislation to require contractors and subcontractors bidding or working on prevailing wage projects to register with the Department of Labor as public works contractors, effective December 30, 2024. This legislation also required that effective that same date, contractors working on public works and covered private projects would also have to submit their certified payroll documents electronically to the DOL. The effective date of the certified payroll filing requirement was pushed back a year to give the DOL adequate opportunity to set up a portal to receive such required information. That portal is now online, and the DOL’s user guide to the portal is available here or go to: https://dol.ny.gov/system/files/documents/2025/12/certified-payroll-contractor-user-guide-12-19-2025.pdf. You can also learn more about the specifics of this subject by registering for our upcoming webinar on this subject here or go to: https://wbgllp.com/wbg-event/new-york-expands-prevailing-wage-yet-again-what-you-need-to-know-and-when-you-need-to-know-it.

Contractors that fail to timely register or electronically submit certified payrolls risk payment delays, debarment, and other enforcement actions by the Department of Labor.

While the industry has had some advance warning of the electronic certified payroll filing requirement, what is new is the expansion of prevailing wage to the offsite fabrication of materials to be installed at a public works project awarded after June 16, 2026 (the statute here limits the application of this provision to “traditional ” prevailing wage projects for public entities, and not private projects receiving government benefits). This requirement applies to materials “solely and specifically designed and engineered for installation in the construction, repair or renovation of a building which is the subject of a contract” with a municipal entity. The intent of this statute is to ensure that workers in fabrication shops making, for example, ductwork for inclusion in public works projects get paid prevailing wage (the rate for which is calculated at the worksite, and not at the offsite facility). While some offsite materials (such as, again, ductwork) will clearly fall into this definition because they are manufactured to unique specifications, that line will be blurred with other materials, such as HVAC equipment, that may start as largely “off the shelf” equipment and require little alteration for use in the public works project, but which are still not “plug-and-play”. Other complications are that this law applies not only to New York operations, but also to operations outside of New York State (and, in fact, the United States), and such fabricators have to register with the DOL as public works contractors. Upstream contractors will no doubt have issues with having that window manufacturer in Henan Province register with the DOL (and, even if they can overcome this hurdle, how do you calculate prevailing wage in Chinese Yuan?). However, even if you’re in contract with, for example, a sheetmetal contractor which is already registered as a public works contractor and which has its own fabrication shop, how is that contractor to segregate its work into prevailing wage and non-prevailing wage work? After all, a 10 foot length of 12 inch duct is the same regardless of whether that item goes into a school building or an office building, and for efficiencies of scale these items are routinely made side by side at the same time. Unfortunately, all that we can say at this point is to stay tuned for developments from the DOL has to how they intend to enforce these requirements (which, clearly, are going to be an administrative headache for contractors).

Finally, in building upon the requirement to pay prevailing wage to truckers who are hauling aggregate (which ushered in DOL’s infamous “50 mile radius” rule), the legislature has determined that any trucker hauling concrete and asphalt (which are not covered as “aggregate” in the older statute) to or from any worksite in New York City or Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, and Putnam Counties pay prevailing wage to its truckers either delivering to or returning from such worksites, and also for their time in loading and unloading. Contractors should expect these requirements to materially impact trucking rates and should address compliance responsibility expressly in their contracts and bid assumptions.  Similarly, it is not yet known whether DOL will impose its 50-mile radius requirement on this new law.

At present, these statutes leave significant unanswered questions regarding enforcement, valuation, and segregation of covered work. Additional guidance from the DOL, or the courts, is expected, but contractors should assume aggressive enforcement. Accordingly, contractors should review their subcontract terms, supplier agreements, and bid pricing now to allocate prevailing wage risk appropriately before these provisions take effect.

For a deeper discussion of these changes and practical compliance strategies, we invite you to attend our upcoming webinar on this topic on Wednesday, January 14, 2026 at 11:00 a.m. While contractors were aware of the registration requirement since 2024, and the follow-on requirement to submit certified payrolls on prevailing wage projects directly to the Department of Labor in electronic format coming into effect with the New Year, the State Legislature has been busy adding to that burden in the form of imposing additional prevailing wage requirements on the hauling of concrete and asphalt in the Downstate region, and on the off-site custom fabrication of materials for installation on a prevailing wage project. The Department of Labor has also been busy setting up, and finally opening, the portal where these certified payrolls are to be submitted. Sign up for this informative webinar so that you’re up to date on the latest developments. Please register here or go to https://wbgllp.com/wbg-event/new-york-expands-prevailing-wage-yet-again-what-you-need-to-know-and-when-you-need-to-know-it. In the interim, please contact Gregory J. Spaun, Esq. at gspaun@wbgllp.com or (914) 607-6425 with any questions.

If you would like more information regarding this topic please contact Gregory J. Spaun at gspaun@wbgllp.com or call (914) 607-6425