2 Teamsters’ Wage Fight Shuts Down Port of Hueneme

A labor dispute sparked by two striking Teamsters shut the Port of Hueneme on Monday, idling hundreds of waterfront laborers and stranding three cargo-laden ships at the docks.

Truckers unwilling to cross a picket line at the port entrance left scores of big rigs backed up on city streets. The chief of the city’s tiny police force called for reinforcements that included a Ventura County sheriff’s helicopter clattering overhead when tensions between picketing Teamsters and longshoremen who wanted to unload the ships threatened to escalate into a physical confrontation.

Picketing is expected to resume this morning, but a tentative deal reached Monday afternoon by Teamsters officials and their counterparts with the International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union should allow some port operations to resume.

“Cargo will come off the ships, but will not be delivered,” said Fernando Basua, president of ILWU Local 46, which represents area workers. “That way the longshoremen can do their work, and hopefully by midday, [the Teamsters] can negotiate a contract.”

Meanwhile, port officials trying to resolve what they called an illegal strike could do little except fret over the damage done to the port’s reputation in the cutthroat world of global commerce.

“We had the port shut down for a day--that gives us a black eye we’re not going to recover from for a while,” spokesman Kam Quarles said. “We’ve made our name in being the more efficient port--the port that was moving while Los Angeles and Long Beach were having labor problems. . . . Shutting down your customers for a day is not the definition of efficiency.”

The dispute began when contract negotiations broke down between Long Beach-based San Pedro Fork Lift and the Teamsters union, which represents two of the company’s employees in this area, said Bill Elder, secretary-treasurer of Teamsters Local 186.

The owner of the company, which is a subcontractor to giant banana shipper Pacific Fruit, is offering an hourly wage of about 40% lower than what other Teamsters make at the port for comparable jobs, Elder said. The union’s fear that such wage erosion could lead to lower pay for all Teamsters at the port prompted the job action, he said.

“He figured we wouldn’t do it for two people,” Elder said. “He doesn’t know how important these brothers are to us.”

Company owner Peter Balov could not be reached for comment.

But the “brothers” in question--actually Joel Hernandez, 61, and his son, Andrew, 22, both of Oxnard--said they were overwhelmed by the show of union solidarity.

“It’s my first strike,” Andrew Hernandez said. “I’m a bit surprised . . . but I appreciate the support.”

The 250 longshoremen scheduled to work Monday initially honored the picket line until an arbitrator called in by the Pacific Maritime Assn., which represents harbor employers, said the strike was illegal and ordered them back to work.

For several tension-filled minutes, burly dock workers approached equally burly Teamsters on the picket line, until ILWU leaders invoked a health and safety clause in their labor contract and ordered the union members to refrain from crossing the potentially violent picket line.

“Thank you brothers,” yelled Elder as the crowd of dockers left to go home for the day. “Solidarity--I appreciate it.”

That was a relief for Port Hueneme Police Chief Stephen Campbell, who had half his 22-member department at the scene, as well as another dozen deputies and officers from neighboring Oxnard and the Sheriff’s Department.

“We thought it would be a confrontation,” Campbell said afterward. “There was a little yelling back and forth, but no physical altercations.”