A Hillsboro janitorial company is forever blacklisted from government work after an investigation by the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries found widespread underpayment of workers.

As part of the settlement, Cornerstone Janitorial must pay $144,000 in damages to 46 workers. That's on top of almost $200,000 in back wages collected by the bureau last year, in connection with Cornerstone employees' work on 16 different taxpayer-funded projects.

Cornerstone has worked as a cleanup subcontractor for some of the region's biggest construction firms in the region. The investigation involved health and education related projects in Portland, Eugene, Stayton, Junction City, Salem, Keizer, Philomath, Vernonia, Corvallis, Monmouth and Wilsonville, according to the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries press release.

Oregon's prevailing wage laws required workers on those public works projects be paid a certain rate.

It's not often a company is permanently barred from government public works contracts. This is the second time the bureau has secured a lifetime ban. Reached by phone Wednesday, Cornerstone's owner, Sang In Nam, declined to comment

State law normally limits bans to three years at a time. But Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian said the bureau obtained the lifetime ban as part of its settlement with Cornerstone.

"With the number of workers involved, and the amount of wages, it was a particularly egregious case," Avakian said in an interview. "We felt Cornerstone should not be working on taxpayer-funded projects anymore."

Cornerstone provided records during the investigation that showed workers were underpaid, bureau spokesman Charlie Burr said. The settlement agreement does not include a statement denying that the company violated wage laws.

Before the settlement, the bureau had assessed $296,831 in civil penalties, $205,5969 in liquidated damages, and given notice of its intent to bar the company from government work for three years, according to the

.

The state's investigation was spurred by a complaint from Hoffman Construction. In 2014, a Cornerstone worker was injured on a job in which Hoffman was the general contractor. At that time, someone from Hoffman noticed during the paperwork process that Cornerstone workers were being underpaid, Burr said.

The injured employee went on to file a whistleblower claim in March 2015 alleging he was fired after Nam learned he had complained of being underpaid. He argued Nam tried to pay him to not cooperate with the state's investigation.

Burr said the labor bureau's civil rights division investigated the case, but the bureau decided not to prosecute the case because of the difficulty of proving the claim. The worker was made aware he could pursue his claim in a civil lawsuit, he said.

-- Bethany Barnes