320
Opinion of the Court
664, as amended, 29 U. S. C. § 50 (known popularly as the Fitzgerald Act).1 See 29 CFR § 29.5(b)(5) (1996); Cal. Lab. Code Ann. § 1777.5 (West 1989 and Supp. 1997). In most circumstances, California public works contractors are not obliged to employ apprentices, but if they do, the apprentice wage is only permitted for those apprentices in approved programs.
The federal arbiter of apprenticeship program adequacy is the Bureau of Apprenticeship and Training (BAT), located within the Department of Labor. An apprenticeship program that seeks to provide federal public works contractors with apprentice-wage-eligible apprentices must receive the blessing of either the BAT or a "State Apprenticeship Agency." 29 CFR § 29.3 (1996). Since 1978, California's state apprenticeship agency, the California Apprenticeship Council (CAC), has been authorized under 29 CFR § 29.12 to approve apprenticeship programs for federal purposes. App. 37. California has also charged the CAC with approving apprenticeship programs for purposes of California's prevailing wage statute. See Cal. Lab. Code Ann. § 3071 (West 1989). Pursuant to the Fitzgerald Act, the United States Secretary of Labor has promulgated apprenticeship program standards. 29 CFR § 29.5 (1996). California has adopted its own apprenticeship standards, 8 Cal. Code Regs. § 212 (1996), that are "substantively similar" to the federal standards. Southern Cal. Chapter of Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc., Joint Apprenticeship Committee v. California Apprenticeship Council, 4 Cal. 4th 422, 434, 841 P. 2d
1 The Fitzgerald Act provides: "The Secretary of Labor is authorized and directed to formulate and promote the furtherance of labor standards necessary to safeguard the welfare of apprentices, to extend the application of such standards by encouraging the inclusion thereof in contracts of apprenticeship, to bring together employers and labor for the formulation of programs of apprenticeship, [and] to cooperate with State agencies engaged in the formulation and promotion of standards of apprenticeship . . . ." 29 U. S. C. §50.
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