Second Striking Pilot Returns to Work at Port

A second striking pilot returned to work at the port of Los Angeles this weekend as the job action entered its third week with no future bargaining sessions scheduled.

City officials have not met with the tiny pilots’ union--which now has 12 members--in a week. Instead, city lawyers are busy analyzing prospects for privatizing the piloting system while protecting the current employees’ jobs, as the union has requested.

“It’s just absurd. They’re stalling,” union attorney Elizabeth Garfield said Monday. “The fact that we’re not back at the bargaining table is ridiculous.”

Paul Cauley of the city’s administrative office said negotiators are waiting for lawyers to review language on items the union had proposed regarding privatization. Separately, attorneys have also been preparing papers for a court hearing Friday on the city’s attempt to block the pilots from striking.

A representative of the Harbor Department said the port was operating at “near normal rates” Monday, the 16th day of the strike. In addition to the two pilots who quit the union and crossed the picket line, the city has two management pilots filling in to move vessels in and out of the harbor.