Bill to raise San Francisco pilot rates tabled

The Pacific Merchant Shipping Association, which opposed the legislation after several compromise proposals were rebuffed, said the pilots “rolled the dice” for millions more in pay increases and lost.    A bill that would have authorized an increase in the pilotage rates for the San Francisco Bay Pilots was tabled in the California legislature last week.
   Opponents of the increase included the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association (PMSA), which represents vessels, ocean carriers, marine terminal operators doing business at all of the public ports in the San Francisco Bay and river system. PMSA said it opposed the legislation after several compromise proposals it offered were rebuffed.
   The PMSA added the 58 pilots involved in the legislation each take home over $450,000 a year in pay.
   “In addition to their sky-high pay of over $450,000 per pilot, ocean going vessels, and ultimately their customers who rely on the Ports in the Bay, also already pay for all the pilots’ expenses, their pilot boats, their training, their licensing board’s operations, and 100 percent of their exceptionally generous and dangerously unfunded pension benefits,” said Mike Jacob, vice president and general counsel for PMSA.
   “These few dozen bar pilots already make more than any other pilots on the West Coast, but turned down an offer of an incremental three percent increase in rates to pay their expenses and for new navigation technology equipment, which the pilots stated was necessary to ensure higher levels of marine safety on the San Francisco Bay. Obviously willing to risk losing the millions of dollars offered by industry to pay for expenses and enhanced maritime safety, the pilots instead gambled that the Legislature would give them millions more in pay increases over and above their expenses.
   “They’ve rolled the dice and lost,” said Jacob.