International Longshoremen’s Association, Local 333: Committed to Bargaining Local Agreement

BALTIMORE - Jan. 21, 2014 - PRLog -- Baltimore, MD: Longshoremen and deep sea cargo workers at the Port of Baltimore who are represented by the International Longshoremen Association, Local 333 are hoping that the STA will return to the bargaining table. Local 333 leadership has repeatedly stated that employees will continue working cargo at the Port while they attempt to get back to the table with management.

Local 333 negotiators have not been able to bargain about mandatory subjects of bargaining and believe areas of agreement during the cooling off period were conspicuously absent from the most recent STA proposal without explanation. Mandatory subjects of bargaining include: training, hours of work, work schedules, grievance procedure, vacancies, discipline and discharge, job duties, testing of employees (which impacts work opportunity), subcontracting and nondiscrimination.  Local 333 is enforcing our right to bargain these issues that are essential to our members with management. Local 333 filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board against the Steamship Trade Association of Baltimore, Inc. (STA), which is the bargaining agent for the stevedoring companies at the Port.

“This is our opportunity, our one opportunity in the past decade, to address policies that have harmed the working men and women in Local 333,” stated Local 333 President Riker McKenzie.

We are going to keep working for Port customers while we try to resolve this dispute, but we cannot be stonewalled by management and fail to gain the contractual changes necessary for our membership.

Local 333 members have been working under a contract that was implemented in 2004.  That contract expired on September 30, 2010. The STA and Local 333 then entered into an extension to engage in negotiations without changing or improving any of its terms.   That extension expired on September 30, 2012.

Despite Local 333’s efforts to negotiate an agreement, which included mediation under the auspices of FMCS, the STA has refused to bargain over subjects that are mandatory under the law, and has engaged in other conduct contrary to reaching agreement.

“Local 333 wants to enter into a new contract with the STA,” said Local 333 President Riker McKenzie.  “But the dedicated men and women working at the Port of Baltimore deserve a fair and just contract.  We will not accept STA’s refusal to negotiate over matters that the law requires them to negotiate.”