Vol. 79/No. 4 February 9, 2015
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| Militant |
| Thousands of dockworkers and supporters march Jan. 22 along waterfront in San Pedro, Calif. |
In recent months the Pacific Maritime Association, which represents the port operators and shipping companies, has accused the longshore union of obstructing work on the docks.
“Nearly three months ago, the ILWU began a coordinated series of slowdowns intended to pressure employers to make concessions at the bargaining table,” the bosses association said in a statement issued the day of the march.
“The ILWU is not responsible for the current congestion crisis at West Coast ports,” a Nov. 10 union press statement said. The real causes include “chassis shortage and dislocation; rail service delays, including a shortage of rail cars nationwide; the exodus of truck drivers who cannot make a living wage; long truck turn times; record retail import volumes (increases of 5.3 percent over 2013); larger vessels discharging massive amounts of cargo; container terminals pushed to storage capacities; and the peak shipping season (i.e., the August through October pre-holiday surge).”
The port bosses have drastically cut night shift crews in the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Before the contract expired, some 2,000 workers were called for night work, Adan Ortega, spokesman for ILWU Local 13, told the Militant. Those numbers were cut by half in the final months of 2014. On Jan. 19 only 300 were called.
After several accidents, the union limited the number of untrained, noncertified operators running cranes, said Bobby Olvera, president of Local 13, at a rally after the march. The employers refuse to train enough operators, he said.
“The PMA thinks they’re going to break us,” Olvera said. “They thought we would crumble.”
A contingent of United Steelworkers, who are locked in negotiations with the big oil companies for a national agreement, joined the march, as did members of Teamsters Local 848, who are fighting to organize port truck drivers. The Pacific Maritime Association has sought to pit drivers, many of whom are misclassified as independent operators and paid by the load, against the ILWU by blaming the longshore workers for delays that cut into truckers’ income.
“We’re here to support the ILWU,” Danny Lima, a driver at the Toll port trucking company, told the Militant. “Teamster port drivers want them to get the best contract they possibly can.”
500 march in Tacoma
Some 500 people rallied in Tacoma Jan. 22 to protest layoffs on the docks and demand a contract. ILWU Local 23 members there were joined by longshore workers from Portland, Oregon; Seattle and Longview, Washington; and Alaska.“With all the bad press, it’s better to be out here reaching the public about what is going on,” Claude Lindsey, who works as a casual on the Tacoma docks, told the Militant. “I have a three-year-old and a one-year-old. Right now because of the PMA layoffs I’m only getting one or two days of work a week.”
“I am the daughter of an ILWU member who died too young due to the conditions of work on the docks,” Meghan Mason, 25, a heavy equipment operator, told the rally. “What do we want? It isn’t a massive raise or change in benefits. We want continually improving safety standards” and for dockworkers’ widows like her mother “to live without fear of losing pensions or health care.”
Mason told the Militant that in November she had joined the Walmart Black Friday picket line in Tacoma to stand with workers fighting for $15 an hour.
“Our brothers and sisters fought to get what we have now and we have to fight to keep it,” ILWU Local 23 President Dean McGrath told the crowd.
Mae McCloud contributed to this article from Tacoma, Washington.
Related articles:
On the Picket Line
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