After defying their union leaders and a federal judge, longshoremen headed back to work ending a wildcat strike that shut down the Port of New York and New Jersey for a second straight day. The picket lines came down and workers reported to the idled port for the 7 p.m shift while cranes that had been still since Tuesday...
Shipping containers are lifted off the ship MSC Bahia at Port Newark in Elizabeth, in this Star-Ledger file photo.After defying their union leaders and a federal judge, longshoremen headed back to work ending a wildcat strike that shut down the Port of New York and New Jersey for a second straight day.
The picket lines came down and workers reported to the idled port for the 7 p.m shift while cranes that had been still since Tuesday morning were lowered into the ready positions.
"They are working tonight," said Jennifer Galvez of Harrison as she dropped her husband, Richard, off at the dock in Newark. "For him to be back to work it’s like (she sighed) awesome."
The strike began on Tuesday, when members of ILA Local 1291, based in the Philadelphia-Camden area, began picketing outside various terminals in the New York-New Jersey port region. More than 200 Local 1291 members lost their jobs when Del Monte Fresh Produce moved its bulk shipping operation from an ILA-staffed terminal in Camden to one in Gloucester that used union workers, but not ILA members.
Union leaders said this strike was carried out by the rank-and-file without their consent. They said they put out a statement on the ILA web site and called shop stewards, asking that picketers put down their signs and that they return to work. ILA leaders have been in contact with local and regional industry officials from the New York Shipping Association and the U.S. Maritime Alliance over the past two days, and have scheduled a meeting on Monday to discuss the Camden job losses.
"The presidents of the locals were called, and told go to Port Newark and Port Elizabeth and go to Staten Island and if you see the picketers, tell them that you’ve got these meetings set up," James McNamara, the ILA spokesman, said earlier in the day. "We’re not dictators. We’re not going to say, ‘Come to work tomorrow! Forget about your First Amendment Rights.’ We asked them to leave and we think that they will."
The president of the New York Shipping Association, Joseph C. Curto, confirmed the two sides would meet on Monday, and said late today afternoon that he was "very confident" operations would return to normal.
At one point Curto released a statement saying he was, "upset with the fact that ILA workers in the Port of New York and New Jersey are penalizing ocean carriers and marine terminal operators who have absolutely no involvement or relationship what-so-ever with the issues that may be occurring in the Port of Philadelphia."
Steve Coleman, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, said it was too early to tell just what the financial impact of the strike has been. But clearly, the shut down could have cost millions of dollars in lost commerce and wages, with thousands of workers - apart from longshoremen — sidelined, and ships halted from loading or unloading thousands of containers, or redirected to competing ports.
According to the Port Authority, the port’s container and bulk cargo terminal in Newark, Elizabeth, Jersey City, Bayonne, Staten Island and Brooklyn generate $36 billion in annual economic activity, linked directly or indirectly to 270,000 jobs.
The New York Shipping Association, a local trade group, joined with its East Coast regional affiliate, the U.S. Maritime Alliance, in asking U.S. District Court Judge Dickinson R. Debavoise in Newark to order an end to the walk-out, and on Tuesday afternoon Debavoise did just that. Union leaders said they passed word to rank and file members of Local 1291 to end the picketing and for members of New York-New Jersey locals to return to work. But when dawn broke over the port today, the picketers were still at the terminal gates.
Louie Aillo was one of the longshoreman striking in solidarity with Camden workers today morning outside the Global Terminal gates in Jersey City. As union members tossed a football or lounged in folding chairs to pass the time, Aillo and fellow members of ILA Local 1588 conceded that they were losing money by striking. But they reminded consumers that longshoremen weren’t the only ones would lose out if the strike persists. After all, said Aillo, the containers they move carry every conceivable commodity, from every port on the globe.
"We ain’t gonna eat," Aillo said, conceding that he and his brethren stood to lose pay. "But you ain’t gonna eat either. K-Mart, Wal-Mart, Sears. You name it, it comes through us."