Dock Jobs Lottery Attracts Women by the Thousands

Thousands of women have put their names in a lottery for a chance at 228 part-time jobs as dockworkers and clerks, positions set aside as part of a discrimination suit settlement, union officials said Wednesday.

The jobs as casuals, or non-union workers for the International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union, are prized for their high pay and recognized as steppingstones to union membership and full-time work.

Casuals earn $16.20 per hour and full-time longshoremen make $22.48 per hour. For those not interested in full-time jobs, the casual work provides good supplemental income.

“It’s been like a run on the bank,” said Art Almeida, secretary-treasurer of ILWU Local 13 in Wilmington.

“We run out of cards and send them to a different office--they run out of cards and send them back here,” Almeida said. “I’d say at least a couple of thousand women have filled out cards, and it’s going to be a lot more than that before we’re through.”

The recruitment drive for women is the second in two years, both done as part of a landmark 1982 court settlement between a group of women and the Pacific Maritime Assn. and the union.

The settlement requires that women fill 35% of part-time dockworker jobs and 17.5% of the full-time work force. Until that percentage is achieved, 35% of casuals hired must be women. There are about 900 casuals and 3,000 full-time dockworkers.

Women have until Tuesday to fill out cards for a drawing Nov. 9 at the ILWU office at 221 W. C St., Wilmington.

Casual longshoreman’s work includes working aboard ships and barges, in the hold or on the deck doing heavy lifting, lashing down cargo containers and checking cargo.

Casual and clerical workers must be able to read, write and speak English. Women selected in the drawing will be asked to take a strength and agility test, a physical examination, and a drug and alcohol screening. Casual work is sporadic, because casuals work only after union members are given the opportunity to fill a shift, and the job does not guarantee future full-time employment.

Neal Schreiner, who has been a casual for more than 18 years, said he and others resent the hiring of additional casuals because work has been infrequent for existing part-timers.

“We’re making $14,000 or $15,000 now, working one or two days a week, so we really don’t need any more,” said Schreiner, who said he has a long history of grudges with the union.

Many casuals also resent being required to have more women among their ranks.

“We feel it’s unfair to make us have to be 35% (women) when the main hall only has to be 17%,” he said.

The last recruitment of women for work on the nation’s busiest harbor, in 1990, filled 350 casual positions.