East Coast Longshore Workers Push to Reject Contract

Rank-and-file longshore workers are pushing to reject another contract, after sending top officials in the East Coast Longshoremen’s union back to the bargaining table in September.

On November 17 ILA members will vote on a new master contract covering 12,000 workers who load and unload ships from Maine to Texas. Their current contract doesn’t expire till September 2010, and the Longshore Workers Coalition, a reform movement within the ILA, is running a vigorous “vote no” campaign.

Dissatisfaction centers on officers’ inadequate proposal to address the pay gap between senior and junior workers. In the mid-1990s the ILA accepted a two-tier wage system that put newer workers far below industry veterans with no pathway to top pay, currently $31 an hour.

LWC activists hope to build on their earlier success turning back concessions. In August the LWC exposed a secret deal between ILA President Richard Hughes and employers that would have erased a raise scheduled for October 1. According to the LWC, this move would have cost ILA members more than $40 million.

Fifty-five picketing LWC members shut down an ILA executive board meeting August 26 in Washington, D.C., and a week later the LWC spearheaded rejection of the givebacks by the union’s 200-member rank-and-file bargaining committee. Now the ILA leadership has brought a new deal forward.

WEAK POSITION

Mike D. Payne, president of ILA Local 1526 in Fort Lauderdale, argues that negotiating in a faltering economy puts the union at a disadvantage.

“We have until next year before our current contract expires,” Payne said. “What’s the rush?”

The LWC succeeded in getting a long-awaited “wage bridge” to connect top and bottom earners onto the table in the latest round of contract talks. But many LWC members believe the current proposal—which requires new members to work at least 700 hours a year for nine years to arrive at top pay—falls short.

“These companies have saved millions, probably billions, of dollars because of the tier program,” said Mark Bass, president of Local 1410 in Mobile, Alabama. “It’s time for individuals to progress and make it to the top tier.”

Bass should know: after a container operation opened in Mobile last year, the operator used the master contract’s rules to push pay for 80 percent of Local 1410 members down to the second tier.
“I had guys who went $13 an hour backwards with no warning,” Bass says.

SHELL GAME

LWC activists also criticize other aspects of the economic package, including cuts in contributions to the union’s health care and container royalty funds by as much as $50 million a year. The royalty fund was originally negotiated in 1960 to compensate dockworkers when the introduction of shipping in standardized containers cut jobs and hours.

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The proposed deal does lift a cap on royalty payments, which could put millions into workers’ pockets—and bolster dwindling union coffers—if shipping traffic returns to pre-recession levels.

But dockers argue that the deal essentially increases wages at the expense of the union’s health care funds and jeopardizes local benefits, including pensions.

“It’s a shell game,” said LWC co-chair Tony Perlstein. “This agreement doesn’t force the companies to put new money on the table to maintain our family benefits, and the ILA leadership is letting them get away with it.”

According to Perlstein, the proposal also funds contract improvements by giving employers a one-time contribution holiday that would cost members another $57 million.

“So we get our October raise, but we have to pay for it,” Perlstein said. “They’re robbing Peter to pay Paul.”

Payne believes the leadership’s strong support for the agreement is linked to proposed changes in the royalty funds that benefit union tops.

“Our union’s treasury has really suffered because of tiered wages, as well as the big salaries they’re paying top officers,” he says.

PORTS ARE BUZZING

LWC members are flooding the ports with contract fact sheets and “vote no” stickers. Activists are traveling port to port to discuss the contract with other members, while International officers are also clocking miles promoting ratification.

"The word on the docks in Charleston is 'no,'" said LWC co-chair Leonard Riley. "But they are putting a lot of energy and money into selling this contract."

ILA leaders are playing on workers' insecurities, Riley said. "They're scaring these people to death, saying we're going to lose work to the West Coast, that tiered wages will be permanent if we vote the contract down," he said.

Riley also reported the LWC will be paying close attention to tomorrow's vote. The 2004 contract was ratified by a narrow margin, and reports of voting irregularities were widespread.