Immigration Rallies Fuel Resolve of Port Truckers

For some of the thousands of truckers who normally roll through Southern California’s ports, staying away from work Monday was more than a statement about their views on U.S. immigration policy. It was an attempt to kick-start changes in working conditions that many complain are dismal.

The port drivers -- predominantly Latinos -- acted individually in deciding to join Monday’s rallies for immigrant rights.

But after returning to their rigs, the notoriously fragmented group marveled at what they had managed to do collectively.

They had forced a vast warehouse and distribution network and the nation’s largest seaport complex to work furiously over the weekend to make up for deliveries that wouldn’t be made Monday. They helped ensure that many businesses would close or not function as normal.

“It gave me the positive thinking and encouragement I needed to be able to continue with this movement. Obviously, there is a problem and we need to do something about it,” trucker Salvador Abrica said.

The Wilmington resident, who described his $20,000 net income last year as “chump change,” spent May Day in Banning Park, encouraging drivers to learn about the Port Drivers Assn., a newly formed alliance to win benefits for drivers who say that their pay is too low and their hours are too long.

The park, located about a dozen blocks from the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, was afire with organizing fervor Monday.

At least three groups vied for the attention of drivers, who suddenly had lots of rare free time on their hands.

“It is significant,” said Nelson Lichtenstein, a labor historian at UC Santa Barbara. “It indicates that with the right combination of aspirations and ideology it’s possible for this slice of the working class to stop the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. If they did it once, they can do it again.”

The Port Drivers Assn. already had its own fliers and T-shirts. Its leaders were unwilling to talk yet about their strategy to hook an elusive catch that has had union organizers salivating for years: a pool of about 10,000 potential members who form a vital step in the movement of clothing, electronics and other imported goods to store shelves throughout the Southwest.

Because most own their trucks, the drivers are classified as individual contractors and are paid per load by the trucking companies with which they do business. The truckers are barred by federal law from joining to set minimum rates and they can’t engage in collective bargaining.

But similar restrictions on Canadian drivers didn’t prevent a seven-week work stoppage in Vancouver last summer that crippled that country’s busiest port. In July, slightly less than half of the 2,500 truckers who work the Southwest Canadian docks refused to haul cargo until their pay and working conditions improved.

The effect was so severe that the Canadian government waived its organizing restrictions and set its own, higher rate for hauling cargo containers. A government task force determined that the shipping industry had failed to provide truckers an adequate income. Since then, many of the drivers have joined the Canadian Auto Workers Union.

To do the same here, port drivers would have to come together on a much larger scale, said Harley Shaiken, a UC Berkeley professor who specializes in labor issues. Still, Southern California drivers on Monday “found out ... that working together they have a lot of economic clout,” he said.

As in Vancouver, drivers here are in short supply.

Few people know that better than Alfonso Manzo, a recruiter for Southern Counties Express trucking company in Carson. For the last three months, Manzo has spent every workday trying to recruit drivers from every cluster of people he encounters at gas stations, catering trucks, restaurants, convenience stores and the like. About 1 in 10 is interested, he said.

“They tell me they can make more money in construction, or in the warehouse and distribution centers and get health benefits as well,” Manzo said.

Manzo’s boss, Southern Counties Express President Brian Griley, told a recent shipping industry gathering that trucking companies were the weak link in the region’s shipping chain because competition has slashed rates so low.

The average port trucker earns less than $11.50 a hour, Griley said in a presentation titled “Does Anyone Want to Drive a Truck?”

It’s a concern shared by several other local trucking company executives, who agreed that the effect of just one day of work stoppage was significant.

“We’ll be lucky if we catch up by the end of the week,” said Bob Curry, chief executive of Long Beach-based California Cartage Co.

Paying truckers more and providing benefits would add costs for shipping lines and importers, who are reluctant to publicly discuss the matter. But shipping experts say the truck driver shortage makes a wage increase inevitable.

“The price of a pair of tennis shoes in Iowa is going to go up a little” to pay for the driver’s higher income, said Redlands economist John Husing. Another cost will be replacing the fleet of aging trucks that the drivers use to move goods, he said.

At Banning Park on Monday, Port Drivers Assn. appeared to be making the most headway. About 100 drivers visited the group’s rickety card table to fill out information forms and compare mileage on their rigs.

Abrica, the sole source of income for his wife and three children, said he cleared about $20,000 last year. Fuel costs, fees, insurance and maintenance on his 1996 Freightliner rig with 922,000 miles on it ate up the rest.

“This is the beginning of the way we change our lives. We provide a tremendous service to this country. It’s right that we get what we deserve,” Abrica said.

A few feet away, Ernesto Nevarez was trying to convince drivers to join a group he described as a port collective. It meets Tuesday evenings, sometimes drawing two truckers, other times up to 20.

“This is a fight for modern day emancipation,” Nevarez said. “These drivers have no rights.”

And continuing a push that had begun last week with a rally near the ports, representatives of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters were out Monday arguing the cause for organizing port drivers, who are driving “sweatshops on wheels,” said Jim Santangelo, president of Teamsters Joint Council 42 in Los Angeles.

UC Berkeley’s Shaiken said that the momentum from Monday’s immigration rallies could be relatively short-lived as calls for change are supplanted by the day-to-day struggle of trying to make a living hauling freight to and from the docks.

“There is a window here. How quickly it begins to close is hard to say,” Shaiken said.

“It won’t shut completely, but people will again be concentrating on surviving and not organizing.”

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By the numbers

Port truckers say expenses eat away at their paychecks. Here’s a breakdown of costs and compensation.

Average weekly pay expenses at Southern California ports

Driver’s weekly pay: $1,500

Fuel: $442

Insurance: $160

Truck payment: $125

Maintenance: $85

Tires: $43

Radio, phone: $22

Net weekly pay: $623

Hours at the wheel: 55

Average hourly pay: $11.33

Source: Southern Counties Express