Pressure mounting on Bush to intervene
By Abigail Goldman and Nancy Cleeland
Los Angeles Times
The high-stakes battle of wills that has closed all commercial West Coast ports and cost billions of dollars in losses continued yesterday, with little progress made on key contract issues.
As a federal mediator shuttled between negotiators for the longshore union and port employers in a San Francisco hotel, a deal was forged to allow crucial shipments to Hawai'i and Alaska. But most ports remained silent, and dozens of container vessels carrying food and other imports joined the growing logjam off the coast.
The Bush administration issued its strongest statement to date on the lockout, calling for both parties to "go back to work and resolve the problems." But press secretary Ari Fleischer declined to say whether Bush was considering federal intervention, which has been urged by a growing number of business and political leaders.
"The President's message to labor and management is simple: You're hurting the economy, you are hurting your fellow workers and unions in other parts of the country, whose jobs depend on the products you ship," Fleischer told reporters in New Hampshire, where the president was attending a political fund-raiser.
Robin Lanier, director of the West Coast Waterfront Coalition, which represents retailers and manufacturers who use the ports, said her organization was "extremely disappointed" in the Bush administration.
"When we are going to have virtually all factories in the U.S. closed down by this, it's not enough to have your press guy read the riot act to both sides," Lanier said.
The Pacific Maritime Association, which represents shipping lines and terminal operators, closed the ports last Sunday after a series of worker slowdowns. It said it would reopen them only if the union signed a new contract or agreed to extend the old one, which would prevent workers from staging disruptions.
A contract extension "will never happen," said International Longshore and Warehouse Union spokesman Steve Stallone. He said union leaders were pleased to see "cracks" in the shutdown and were pushing for further exceptions.
The union and shipping group have been in negotiations for nearly five months. Talks bogged down on employers' desire to introduce labor-saving technology, such as scanners. The union said it would accept such technology only if guaranteed control of the information and jurisdiction over all related jobs.
Both sides consider the outcome of the dispute key to their future. Negotiations were expected to continue until midnight and resume today.
Businesses continued to watch nervously as the dispute wore into its second week. In a letter last week to the Bush administration requesting intervention, a retail trade organization said the situation was becoming critical.
"With the retail industry and consumer spending largely propping up a weak economy, the inability to get goods off the ships will quickly result in idling of distribution centers, closure of stores and layoffs of workers," wrote Tracy Mullin, president of the National Retail Federation.
One study estimated economic losses from the shutdown at $1 billion a day.
