The ports embroiled in a labor dispute are expected to resume operations Monday without a long-term solution in sight.
BY JACOB PALMER | OB DIGITAL NEWS EDITOR
West Coast ports are expected to reopen today after being shutdown for the weekdown due to labor strife and worker slowdowns.
USA Today reported on the shutdown and expected reopening:
The International Longshore and Warehouse Union, which represents dockworkers, says the move to shut the ports only made matters worse. The temporary closure came amid negotiations for a new contact.
“Employers are deliberately worsening the existing congestion crisis to gain the upper hand at the bargaining table,” said union president Robert McEllrath in a statement. He disputed operators’ assertions that the docks are clogged with cargo, saying photos prove “there are acres of asphalt just waiting for the containers on those ships.”
The Port of Portland, in an effort to not be a casualty of wide-reaching implications of the unsuccessful labor negotiations, has made a contingency plan in case of another shutdown — OregonLive.com’s Mike Francis reports:
Josh Thomas, a spokesman for the Port of Portland, said Friday port officials are planning how to handle a lockout of or strike by longshore workers at the port. Because some port tenants don’t use longshore labor and aren’t party to the contract negotiations, port security officials are discussing how to operate and staff “neutral gates” where such tenants could enter and exit their facilities. He said the port’s security force is prepared to coordinate with the Portland Police Bureau to monitor activities at the neutral and contested gates.
In Portland on Friday, the Hanjin Copenhagen container ship is at Terminal 6 in the Rivergate Industrial District, but longshore workers aren’t loading or unloading cargo from the vessel. The longshore local informed ICTSI Oregon, which operates Terminal 6, it wouldn’t work Friday because it was demonstrating a grievance over several recent incidents at the terminal, an ICTSI spokesman said. He said the notification came at 6:55 a.m., a little more than an hour before the workers’ shift was to begin.
The cost of the shutdowns along the West Coast has been a $2-billion-a-day loss to the United States economy according to a report done by a management consulting firm.
The Puget Sound Business Journal reports:
Congestion at West Coast ports, including the ports of Seattle and Tacoma, could cost retailers as much as $7 billion this year.
If the ports shut down entirely for 10 days, it could cost the country $2.1 billion per day. The total two-year impact could be as much as $37 billion.
The Corvallis Gazette Times reported on the unrest among mid-valley businesses due to the uncertainty of the situation:
Emotions are running high among local business owners and managers as containers filled with mid-valley products such as compressed straw destined for Japan and South Korea, grass seed headed to sites throughout Europe and China and frozen fruits and vegetables coming into Oregon, await being loaded or unloaded.
Stan Boshart, owner of Boshart Trucking and BOSSCO in Tangent, estimates the battle on the docks is costing him at least $1,500 per day.
