Union Offers to Cut Jobs in Port Talks
Seeking to break a stalemate in contract talks covering West Coast ports, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union has offered to accept new technologies that it says would cut hundreds of high-paid jobs in exchange for increases in wages and pension benefits.
Union spokesman Steve Stallone said the 11-page proposal, submitted Tuesday night, would save shipping lines at least $100 million a year through increased efficiencies and lower labor costs.
The introduction of labor-saving technology at port terminals has been the most contentious element of these contract negotiations. Stallone said this proposal gives the Pacific Maritime Assn., which represents shipping lines and cargo loading companies, what it says it wants.
“To a certain extent, we’re calling them out, asking, ‘Are you really serious about negotiating?’ ” he said.
But the PMA said the union’s offer did not go far enough.
“This proposal may have taken the ball a few yards down the field, but there’s a long way to go with time running out on the clock,” said association President Joe Miniace. He said the association would submit a counterproposal Wednesday evening, but would not provide details.
A source close to the talks said PMA negotiators believe the number of union-covered clerical jobs actually would jump under the proposal. That is because the union would expand its jurisdiction to jobs that are sometimes performed by nonunion contractors, such as planning the layout of a ship’s cargo.
The union said those jobs should be union under the existing contract, and noted it has won more than a dozen arbitration cases on the issue.
The contract, which covers about 10,500 dockworkers, was due to expire July 1 but has been extended by both parties on a day-to-day basis since then.
Negotiations have been closely watched by retailers and manufacturers across the country, who depend heavily on the movement of goods to and from Asia and worry about the prospect of a strike or lockout.
Many had hoped a deal would be reached by Monday, when union representatives gather for a long-planned caucus.
Several observers close to the talks said that now appears unlikely, although movement by both sides Wednesday indicates a deal could be reached by the end of the month.
The proposal is the union’s first detailed response to the PMA’s calls for efficiency-boosting technology at West Coast ports. Stallone said the ILWU spent “considerable time” writing it up, and compared the document to a breakthrough union agreement that allowed ports to convert to the use of truck-size containers in the early 1960s.
Among other things, the offer allows for the free flow of data into the ports from shippers in Asia, trucking companies and other sources.
It proposes establishing “terminal control centers,” operated by marine clerks, to monitor the information. The number of clerks staffing entry gates would be cut in half, as scanners and other equipment automatically input data such as the container number into the computer system.
In supporting documents, the union repeatedly assures the PMA that clerks will not retype information that is already in the computer--a recurring complaint from the association. It also repeatedly insists that any remaining clerical jobs, as well as any jobs created by the new technology, be handled by marine clerks.
The proposal covers only technology issues, and the union did not specify improvements it wants in pension benefits or wages, which are still being negotiated.
About 2,100 marine clerk jobs are assigned daily at the 29 main ports on the coast, including the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, and the agreement would reduce those jobs by about 630 per day, Stallone said. However, the union expects growth in cargo to erase those losses within a few years.
Clerks on average earned $118,000 last year, including overtime, according to maritime association records.
Longshore workers, the bulk of union members, earned an average of $83,000 last year, while foremen earned $158,000.
