United team: The ILWU’s 16-member Longshore Negotiating Committee and 8-member Safety Sub-Committee reached a tentative contract agreement on February 20 with unanimous support.
It wasn’t quick or easy, but the ILWU Longshore Negotiating Committee reached a tentative agreement for a new 5-year contract with the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) on February 20th.
ILWU International President Bob McEllrath praised the 16-member Negotiating Committee and 8-member Safety Sub-Committee for their months of hard work – and he saluted rank-and-file members and local union officials for maintaining exceptional discipline and unity during the grueling 9-month negotiating process that began on May 12, 2014.
“This was the longest contract negotiation we’ve faced in decades,” said McEllrath, “but the final result is a good agreement that wouldn’t have been possible without the unity and support from members up and down the coast.”
Next steps
The tentative agreement will first be reviewed by 90 delegates of the Coast Longshore Caucus who are scheduled to meet March 30 to April 3. Caucus delegates will decide whether to recommend the proposal to the rank-and-file. If recommended, the complete agreement will be mailed to members, followed by discussions at local union meetings. The process ends with a secret-ballot election that allows members to ratify or reject the proposal. Detailed voting results will be published in a future issue of The Dispatcher.
Milestones
The Committee approached their negotiating task with clear directions from the Coast Longshore Caucus that met for two weeks beginning February 24, 2014. The Negotiating Committee opened talks with the PMA on May 12 and continued bargaining past the contract expiration date of July 1, 2014. Important progress was announced in late August when both sides agreed to maintain health benefits for workers, families and pensioners. The next issue tackled by the Negotiating Committee involved the problems caused by PMA companies that sub-contracted their container chassis pools.
It was also at this point that a pre-existing port congestion problem reached a crisis point. Tensions mounted as PMA companies tried to avoid responsibility for the congestion caused primarily by poor planning and bad business decisions, including:
- Subcontracting chassis units, causing shortages and logistical problems.
- Using massive new containers vessels without proper planning.
- Combining containers from several carriers onto one “alliance” vessel.
- Failing to pay port truckers a living wage, causing driver shortages
- Failing to properly plan for record volumes of containers.
- Failing to train enough dockworkers to operate equipment.
As bargaining continued into the fall, the PMA increasingly accused ILWU members of causing congestion at the ports and charged the union members with orchestrating slowdowns in early November – while companies put pressure on workers by cutting shifts and reducing operations, beginning in Pacific Northwest ports, then spreading down the coast.
By January 13, the PMA had eliminated night and evening shifts, slashing container and cargo loading and unloading operations by 60%. Soon the docks were empty, but employers were still insisting that no space was available to unload ships. Local 13 member and private airplane pilot Rollo Hartstrom joined with Local 94 member and photographer Bill Kirk to take aerial photos that proved PMA’s misleading claims.
Mobilization
Members in Southern California and the Puget Sound mobilized on January 22 for an impressive show of unity. Local 13 President Bobby Olvera, Jr. and Local 23 President Dean McGrath organized separate but coordinated events that brought together thousands of longshore workers, families, community leaders and elected officials who showed their support for a fair contract.
Resolution
In late January, union negotiators reached a resolution that maintained ILWU jurisdiction for inspecting chassis units at the ports. With just a few issues remaining, President Obama assigned Labor Secretary Tom Perez to the talks on February 14, joining federal mediator Scot Beckenbaugh who was invited to help by the ILWU and PMA in early January. After the PMA agreed to improve the area arbitration system by making it more fair, a tentative agreement was reached the evening of February 20, supported unanimously by the ILWU Negotiating Committee.
Local agreements
In addition to resolving the “coastwise” contract agreement, separate local agreements were negotiated by union leaders to address issues at local ports. For example, Locals 13, 63 and 94 in Southern California were able to negotiate important terms to improve staffing and transparency. Local 10 was able to negotiate local improvements for manning and equalization.
“The efforts of local leaders, rank-and- file members, and our Negotiating Committee were all pulling in the same direction for the same goal,” said President McEllrath. “That kind of unity is the only way for workers to win.”