Port Labor Deal Struck

After months of acrimony and costly showdowns that rippled through the national economy, the longshore union and shipping companies reached a deal late Saturday on a labor contract covering all U.S. commercial ports on the West Coast.

Details of the six-year contract were sketchy, but it was clear that both sides gave deeply while winning important concessions. Talks had intensified over the last week as senior federal mediator Peter J. Hurtgen pushed for a deal before the Thanksgiving holiday.

“I am very pleased that labor and management have reached an agreement concerning the West Coast ports,” President Bush said in a statement, which was released by the White House as negotiators signed the deal in San Francisco. “This agreement is good for workers, good for employers and it’s good for America’s economy.”

The agreement, which must be ratified by union members, was reached about one month before the expiration of a federal injunction that kept the ports open and operating normally.

Bush sought the court order last month under the Taft-Hartley Act after alleged union slowdowns and a 10-day management lockout created chaos on the waterfront and beyond.

The Taft-Hartley Act, which was last invoked in 1978, has rarely led to successful contracts, and instead often antagonizes both parties in the dispute, according to labor historians.

In this case, however, Hurtgen and two other federal mediators, along with AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka, were credited with being moderating forces at the table.

The Pacific Maritime Assn., which represents about 80 shipping lines and terminal operators, came away with the right to implement labor-saving technology, such as computer systems that allow cargo lists to flow directly into terminals rather than being retyped by union clerks.

Those systems and other new equipment, such as optical scanners and remote cameras, will speed cargo movements while eliminating hundreds of high-wage clerical jobs. The industry had unsuccessfully sought such an agreement in the previous two contracts.

In turn, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s 10,500 dockworkers won substantial increases in their pensions and held on to fully paid family health insurance, with large premium increases being absorbed completely by the employers.

The shipping group last month offered a pension that would have put maximum benefits at $50,000 a year. The union insisted on far more, up to $70,000 a year.

The final amount was not released Saturday, but was said to fall between the two proposals.

Wages increased moderately overall, although some skilled equipment operators will see large gains.

Negotiators for the union and shipping association signed the full contract in San Francisco about 10:30 p.m.

Hurtgen declined to discuss details of the plan until it is ratified by union members, but said it “provides substantial improvement in wages and benefits for the union’s members.”

“It also provides necessary technology and dispute resolution improvements needed to ensure that America’s West Coast ports continue to modernize and increase in both efficiency and productivity,” Hurtgen said in a statement.

The chief adversaries during the talks were James Spinosa, president of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, and Joseph Miniace, president of the Pacific Maritime Assn.

At the first meeting with Hurtgen last summer, Spinosa stormed out of the federal building, incensed that Miniace had arrived with a pair of armed bodyguards. Miniace insisted that the bodyguards were warranted because he had received death threats.

Miniace, a seasoned and tough contract negotiator, had no maritime experience before being tapped for the maritime association’s top job in 1995.

Union negotiators often complained that his hard-line approach in talks upset a long-standing friendly relationship between the union and management.

Several shipping company executives, however, said they had grown resentful of what they described as the union’s sense of entitlement and refusal to accept new technology. They said they hired Miniace specifically to change the dynamic.

In a statement issued as the contract was signed, Miniace indirectly addressed those frictions.

“With this contract, we are ushering in a new era of modernization,” he said. “It’s also time to usher in a new era of mutual respect and trust between the PMA and ILWU.”

Union officials could not be immediately reached for comment.

The contract represents a milestone that some compare to the 1960 Mechanization and Modernization Agreement, which was forged by the union’s iconic longtime president, Harry Bridges.

That agreement allowed the industry to ship cargo in truck-sized containers that were loaded and unloaded by cranes, rather than the old, inefficient method of piling goods onto pallets.

Containerization eliminated thousands of union jobs and led to huge increases in productivity on the docks.

In exchange, Bridges wanted guarantees that all remaining jobs stayed in the union, and that union members shared in the new wealth.

Longshore wages increased dramatically as a result, and now ILWU members are among the highest-paid blue-collar workers in the nation.

According to the shipping association, annual wages range from about $80,000 to more than $150,000.