ILWU Local 8 Union walks off the job at Port of Portland According To Business Press-: Is a strike or lockout next?

ILWU Local 8 Union walks off the job at Port of Portland According To Business Press: Is a strike or lockout next?
Nov 26, 2014, 1:36pm PST
http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2014/11/26/union-walks-off-the-j...
On Monday, the International Longshoreman and Warehouse Union walked off the job at the Port of Portland, said Peter Friedmann, executive director of the Agricultural Trade Coalition.
Spokesman for the port managing authority, the Pacific Maritime Association, Wade Gates confirmed this but didn't have further details aside from the fact that the terminal has operated for the last two days.
Craig Merrilees, spokesman for the ILWU, couldn't confirm whether union workers walked off.
It's been 12 years since negotiations between the ILWU and the PMA have been this rocky.
In 2002, the PMA locked the ILWU out for 10 days. The U.S. lost $1 billion a day and then-President George W. Bush used the Taft-Hartley Act to pursue executive intervention and force ports along the West Coast to resume work.
On July 1 of this year, the labor contract between the PMA and ILWU expired. They've been working without a contract since. Negotiations turned ugly at the beginning of November when accusations about the cause of slowdowns started flying from both sides.
The barrage of blameful press releases have outside parties worried that a deal is unlikely to happen quickly.
Letters to and from government leaders, including the president, asking for intervention and a return to normalcy have been flooding inboxes all over the West Coast and the nation.
Outside agencies, affected by the massive backup of imports and exports sitting in bays and on docks along the West Coast, are worried the ports will shut down during the peak holiday shipping season.
Most of the affected organizations outside the PMA and ILWU get their information on congestion from rumors or news reports. They're not privy to the private negotiations.
No one, including the union and management, wants a repeat of 2002.
"Everyone involved would love to have this never happen again," said Art Scheunemann, senior vice president of business development for Northwest Container Services, a marine logistics provider for Puget Sound ports.
Are we following the same path that led to the 2002 lockout?
The answer is no. But whether that is a good thing or a bad thing depends on whom you ask.
"No, it's not the same path," Merrilees said.
Merrilees continues to insist that worrying about a port shutdown is a waste of time.
"Nobody that knows anything about the talks are worried about lock outs or strikes," he said. "Both parties are making progress and moving forward."
But some say it's actually worse than before, and that a 10-day shutdown that results in productive talks and a finalized deal is better than months of ineffective, slow ports.
It's like the difference between ripping off and slowly peeling off a Band-Aid.
"I remember ships sitting in the harbor," Scheunemann said about the 2002 lock out. "In that 10-day period there was sincere negotiating. Now it's not clear what's happening at any meeting. It's like Congress."
Many of the letters call for executive action by the president to send in a federal mediator. But at the moment, even that is off the table. Both the PMA and ILWU must agree to it, which doesn't look likely.
If the PMA were to lock out the union, or the union was to go on strike, the president could intervene under the Taft-Hartley Act. Unless that happens, or the PMA and ILWU agree to mediation, he can't intervene.