PAGE 2 | February 21, 2020 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
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...ILWU case
From Page 1
The case stems from a dispute
that began in 2012. ILWU mem-
bers employed by ICTSI waged
a disciplined and coordinated
slowdown at Terminal 6, operat-
ing cranes and driving trucks
more slowly than usual. That
would have been legal, except
that the National Labor Rela-
tions Board (NLRB) determined
that ILWU’s motive was to get
ICTSI to put pressure on the Port
of Portland to give the union ju-
risdiction over two jobs plugging
and unplugging refrigerated con-
tainers. That made the slowdown
a violation of the anti-union
1947 federal law known as Taft-
Hartley. Among other things,
Taft-Hartley bars unions from
taking economic action against
one employer in order to target
another employer, and it gives
employers the right to sue for
economic damages if they do.
The dispute also put ILWU at
odds with others in organized la-
bor because the jobs at issue had
historically been represented by
IBEW Local 48.
ICTSI is owned by Phillipine
billionaire Enrique Razon, and
has been involved in significant
disputes with longshore unions
in Indonesia and Madagascar.
On Feb. 14, ICTSI’s Portland
general manager Elvis Ganda
watched the proceedings on one
side of the courtroom while
ILWU President Willie Adams
looked on from the other side.
ILWU attorney Dan Jackson
argued that ICTSI grossly in-
flated its estimate of economic
damages. He also said ICTSI
had not shown that the slow-
down was solely motivated by
the illegal motive of putting
pressure on a third party, as op-
posed to other ongoing disputes
with ICTSI.
Simon could leave the jury
award as is, reduce the amount,
or order a new trial that would
focus just on the damages. After
three hours of legal arguments
by the two sides, Simon said he
would issue a decision within 60
days.
Simon didn’t say how he’s
likely to rule, but at various
points he did say he found some
of ILWU’s arguments persua-
sive. One expert witness called
by ICTSI had cherry-picked data
to inflate damage calculations,
and his model had assumed that
ICTSI could raise prices and still
increase volume, in violation of
accepted economic theory. But
Simon also faulted ILWU attor-
neys for not having made that ar-
gument more forcefully earlier
in the trial.
ILWU has said ICTSI is try-
ing to get the union to pay for
losses that members weren’t re-
sponsible for, and reimburse for
profits that the company wasn’t
likely to make. The Port of Port-
land had been losing money at
Terminal 6 for years; that’s why
the public body privatized the
terminal in the first place, sign-
ing a 25-year lease agreement
with ICTSI. Terminal 6 has sev-
eral disadvantages that make it
less than competive with other
West Coast ports: It’s far upriver
from the ocean, and shipping
channels in the Columbia River
aren’t deep enough for the new
generation of bigger more cost-
effective cargo ships. No other
terminal operator has stepped in
since ICTSI ended operations in
2017.
If Judge Simon finds that the
jury damage award isn’t sup-
ported by evidence of real eco-
nomic damage, he could reduce
the award to $27.6 million: $20
million for equipment ICTSI
had to abandon when it ended
operations at Terminal 6 and
money it owed the Port to termi-
nate its lease agreement; plus up
to $7.6 million in direct dam-
ages due to lost productivity
during the slowdown.
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