Hawai'i cargo to flow again in dock waiver
By Karen Blakeman
Advertiser Staff Writer
Hawai'i has received an exemption to the port shutdown that has paralyzed the West Coast, and dockworkers will begin loading ships with cargo bound for the Islands today.
• A federal mediator shuttled between representatives of dockworkers and management at a San Francisco hotel, with talks expected to go through the weekend. • Fifty-one groups representing retailers, farmers and manufacturers asked for a White House meeting to help end the lockout. The Toy Industry Association, representing companies including Mattel Inc.; the American Farm Bureau Federation; and the International Mass Retail Association, whose members include Wal-Mart, signed the letter. • In Asia, Toyota, Honda Motor Co., Nissan and South Korea's Hyundai Motor Co. began airlifting parts to keep U.S. plants and service centers running. • Shipping delays may harm growth in Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore in the wake of a 2001 slump, economists said. • In Europe, dockworkers may join the dispute by boycotting some vessels, said Kees Marges of the International Transport Workers' Federation. • A White House spokeswoman said the administration is continuing to monitor the lockout but planned no immediate action. • Republican farm-state lawmakers stepped up efforts to get President Bush involved. Ten GOP senators, including Senate Minority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi, introduced a resolution urging the two sides to enter into mediation while adopting 24-hour extensions of the expired collective-bargaining agreement. If a settlement cannot be reached, the resolution urges the president to use the emergency powers granted under the Taft-Hartley Act. • Ports along the Eastern Seaboard began bracing for the possibility of an onslaught of cargo as ships leaving Europe and Asia scramble to find a way to unload tens of thousands of containers that normally would be handled by the West Coast ports. • Mexico's Pacific Coast ports are lowering docking rates, expanding storage room and speeding up land deliveries to handle a dramatic increase in ship traffic. Since Monday, the port of Ensenada, about 100 miles south of San Diego, has been docking at least two additional vessels a day originally bound for Long Beach, Calif. Other Mexico ports are dealing with similar increases.
The Pacific Maritime Association, which represents more than 80 shipping companies and terminal operators, said late last night that it had granted the exemption requested by the state.
Yesterday's developments:
"This is good news for the people of Hawai'i," said Jackie Kido, spokesman for Gov. Ben Cayetano. "There are people here on very tight margins. This is not what they needed."
Kido said Joe Miniace, president of the association, told Cayetano about 7:30 p.m. that the governor's request for an exemption had been granted.
With the first ships being loaded today, officials with the Islands' two major shipping companies said the relief will take time: Ships lined up at the 29 West Coast ports must have incoming cargo unloaded before any outbound cargo to Hawai'i can be loaded, a process that will take up to two days.
The trip across the Pacific takes approximately five days.
"Even if we start work (today), we're looking at a week from Sunday before we see anything here," said James Andrasick, president and chief executive of Matson Navigation Co., the largest shipping company for the Islands.
Brian Taylor, vice president and general manager for Hawai'i and Guam for the Islands' other major shipping company, CSX Lines, said one CSX ship will be ready for loading a little sooner because it was being worked when the shutdown was announced Sunday.
"It is at the pier, under the cranes and ready to go," he said.
Steve Sugerman, a spokesman for the carriers' association, said last night that the vote by the association's board was unanimous in favor of the exemption for Hawai'i, which relies on shipping for more than 90 percent of its goods.
"As long as PMA has assurances from the union that there will not be any work slowdowns ... We haven't been able to talk with them about this yet, but we're confident that when we do the union will give us the assurances we've been looking for," he said.
International Longshore & Warehouse Union officials had said earlier this week that they supported the exemptions requested by Alaska and Hawai'i, the two states most dependent on shipping from the West Coast.
The exemption comes five days into the shutdown by the carriers' association, which locked out some 10,500 dockworkers at all Pacific ports, creating a growing economic ripple effect as more than 100 container ships stack up along the West Coast unable to unload.
West Coast shipping companies and dockworkers have been trying to negotiate a new contract for months, with talks growing increasingly tense. The dock shutdown by the association came Sunday after it said dockworkers were staging work slowdowns.
The association has said it will not reopen the ports until the union agrees to a new contract or extends the contract that has lapsed. The union denies any work slowdowns, and has said workers were simply working to rule for safety reasons.
Many Hawai'i businesses had been stockpiling goods as the contract dispute escalated, and most have said they have enough inventory to weather a week or two of cargo disruption.
Still, after five days of the shutdown, cutbacks in work hours in industries from trucking to shipping and increased costs for air freight for some businesses had begun to grow, leading to increasing concern that a protracted shutdown could seriously harm the state's already fragile economy.
Hawai'i's exemption comes the same day that the shipping association announced it had granted a similar exemption request by Alaska, allowing shipments by CSX to join Totem Ocean Trail Express in sending food and other necessary supplies to the 49th state.
"We had a message from the governor and several members of congress about food shortages," said the association's Sugerman. "We responded to that need."
That exemption early yesterday contained no provision for Hawai'i.
"We asked for Alaska and Hawai'i," Steve Stallone, a spokesman for the international office of the ILWU, said early yesterday. " ... (The shipping association) granted Alaska, but not Hawai'i. We asked again this morning; they said no. We asked again this afternoon ... "
Stallone could not be reached for comment late last night after the shipping association announced it had approved Hawai'i's exemption.
Hawai'i's top political leaders, who were gathered in Honolulu yesterday for the funeral of congresswoman Patsy Mink, also had banded together to press for the exemption.
Cayetano continued calling the shipping association and ILWU officials throughout the day, and Sen. Dan Inouye met with Allen Doane, chief executive officer of Alexander & Baldwin, parent company of Matson. Inouye also met with Bo Lapenia, president of Local 142 of the ILWU.
"For the senator," said Jennifer Goto Sabas, Inouye's chief of staff, "it was important that both management and labor be united in this request."
Management and labor officials agreed the exemption should be granted, she said. Inouye drafted a letter requesting the exemption, enlisted the support and signatures of Sen. Dan Akaka and congressman Neil Abercrombie, and faxed it to the shipping association.
"Ocean shipping is the lifeline of Hawai'i and your support of this urgent request will be greatly appreciated," Inouye wrote.
In the letter, he noted that space is very limited in Hawai'i, "and inventories are being depleted rapidly."
While the Alaska and Hawai'i exemptions were under consideration yesterday, shipping association and ILWU negotiators continued to meet; they met Thursday, most of Thursday night, yesterday morning and last night, said Stallone, the union spokesman.
But progress, Stallone said, was minimal.
Meanwhile, according to information provided to The Associated Press by senior Bush administration officials, the president is considering appointing a board of inquiry to determine the economic impact of the dock shutdown — a potential first step toward ordering workers back to their jobs under the Taft-Hartley Act.
If the board of inquiry finds that the lockout is hurting the U.S. economy and the parties have not been negotiating in good faith, Bush then would have to make his case in federal court, asking for a ruling to end the lockout for an 80-day cooling off period because the dispute is "imperiling the national health or safety."
It would mark the first time the act had been used in a lockout, as opposed to a strike.
Stallone said ILWU workers and Teamsters are holding a rally in Oakland today to protest the lockout by the shipping companies, as well as Bush's possible use of the Taft-Hartley Act to intercede.
