Burlington Construction Co. Cited Nearly $400K For Wage Violation

BURLINGTON, MA — Burlington-based Machados Construction Services LLC was cited nearly $400,000 by the Massachusetts attorney general for violating prevailing wage laws in a public construction project.

The company and its manager, Leandro Machado, were issued five citations totaling $398,913 in penalties and restitution to workers. The citations relate to work at the Sutton Police Station project.

According to the attorney general's office, Machados and two other companies underpaid 23 workers on the project. Investigators received a referral saying that workers on the project were paid only $15 to 20 per hour for carpentry work, far below the state prevailing wage rate of $68.72 per hour.

Payroll records demanded by investigators showed that employees of the three companies were regularly underpaid for their work on the Sutton project.

The other two companies cited were Real Construction Inc. and WF North Lion Inc.

Investigators also found that Machados had not paid employees the prevailing wage on another public construction project for the Malden Housing Authority, the attorney general's office said in a news release.

Prevailing wage laws require that contractors working on public works projects pay a higher minimum wage and submit regular payroll records to the authority that contracts them.

Christopher Huffaker can be reached at 412-265-8353 or chris.huffaker@patch.com.