FMCS Commends Pacific Maritime & International Longshore and Warehouse Union On Reaching Tentative Contract Agreement
WASHINGTON, July 16 /PRNewswire/ – Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS) Director Designee C. Richard Barnes this morning commended the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) and the Pacific Maritime Association on reaching tentative agreement late Thursday on a new three-year contract. The agreement, if ratified, will cover more than 10-thousand dock workers in California, Oregon and Washington.
“I am very pleased that the negotiating committees were willing and able to work through their differences during two months of tough bargaining and reach this agreement,” said Barnes. “The result is critical to the future of the 100 shipping lines, stevedore companies and terminal operators who make up the Pacific Maritime Association, and to the thousands of dock workers at our nation’s West Coast seaports,” he continued. “And, this agreement is just as critical to stability of the U.S. and Asian economies, directly affecting nearly $300-billion in international trade per year – more than half of all the containerized, waterborne cargo reaching America’s shores.”
The tentative agreement is subject to ratification by members of the ILWU and the executive board of the Pacific Maritime Association.
FMCS is an independent agency of the United States Government, created by Congress in 1947 to provide mediation in labor-management contract disputes, preventing or minimizing the impact of strikes and lockouts on the nation’s economy.
