LA/Long Beach port driver strike enters second day

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s office says there are “plenty of trucks and drivers.”    Port truck drivers working at the ports of Los Angeles/Long Beach said they will continue a strike against four drayage companies that began Monday.
   The drivers have targeted Intermodal Bridge Transport, Pacific 9 Transportation (Pac 9), Pacer Cartage, and Harbor Rail Transport. Area drivers have long claimed they should be classified as employees, not independent contractors, and, as such, are being subjected to “wage theft.”
   Justice for Port Truck Drivers, a Teamster affiliate, said the drivers put up picket lines at trucking company headquarters and truck yards that continued through the night.
   Drivers were stationed at marine terminals and awaited trucks for “ambulatory picketing” — picketing trucks of the targeted companies as they arrived at terminals.
   The organizers of the strike said they were “causing major disruption to the operation of the trucking companies and their retail clients whose cargo was left sitting on the docks.” They added “drivers extended their picket lines as far south as the U.S./Mexico border, where drivers picketed Pacer Cartage trucks bringing cargo to Toyota’s Otay Mesa facility just north of the border for transfer to Toyota Mexico’s manufacturing plants causing significant disruption to Toyota’s cross-border operations.”
   The Port of Long Beach, on the other hand, said, “Dockworkers have reported to work and truckers have been able to enter and exit the affected terminals without delay.”
   Jeff Millman, spokesperson for Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said of the strike, “The Port of Los Angeles is serviced by 800 trucking companies operating 13,700 trucks, so there are plenty of trucks and drivers to keep commerce flowing.”
    “Cargo will continue to move swiftly at the nation’s number port,” said Millman. “Port truck drivers are a critical link in our global economy and they deserve quality working conditions. We appreciate those trucking companies who are having an honest dialogue about these issues. Teamsters are targeting four trucking companies that they allege are violating workers’ rights.”
   During a press conference yesterday, Barbara Maynard, a spokesman for Justice for Port Truck Drivers said that since the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are “proprietary departments of their respective cities” this the “puts the mayors in a very strong position to actually be able to affect change” because “anybody doing business on port property has got to obey all local, state and federal laws.”
   Maynard contended the mayors could help the striking drivers by telling the trucking companies “you need to start obeying the law, or you need to get off the property” and said a petition drive aimed at the two mayors is already underway.