Hundreds of port clerks to lose jobs to automations.

Loss of high-pay jobs could further cripple recovery

As many as 500 of the 700 maritime clerks now employed by companies operating at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach will be terminated in the next two to three years because port-related employers are automating their "notification process," according to local foreign trade experts.

Phasing out clerks will save Los Angeles and Long Beach companies millions of dollars in annual wages, helping them to compete in the expanding global economy.

But the move to automation will also result in the loss of hundreds more high-pay jobs from L.A.'s struggling economy. The average annual income earned by union clerks in Long Beach and Los Angeles, including overtime pay, is $77,743, according to the San Francisco-based Pacific Maritime Association.

That maritime industry trade group negotiates on behalf of trade-related companies in hammering out labor contracts with the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union.

Companies' move to automation was at least partially to blame for the total number of ILWU clerks in Los Angeles County falling to 650 today from 709 in 1988, according to the Pacific Maritime Association.

Officials at containerized-freight service companies, which employ most of the local clerks, deferred comment on the upcoming labor negotiations to the trade group.

The Pacific Maritime Association and ILWU will start negotiating a new contract in April or May, said Carrie Clemmons, a Los Angeles-based spokeswoman for the trade group.

Most ILWU clerks at the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles work for the container terminal operators, such as Sea-Land Service Inc. in Long Beach.

A Sea-Land personnel worker who asked not to be named said Sea-Land has employed 70 union clerks for the past three years, but would not say if Sea-Land will seek a reduction of clerk jobs in the upcoming labor negotiations.

Based on industry salary data for Los Angeles, Sea-Land is paying $5.4 million in union clerks' wages per year, excluding employer payroll tax contributions.

"If the automation continues. . .the union clerk jobs will start to be phased out," said Gene Banday, legislative representative for the Southern California Counsel of the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union.

Frank Pisano, regional vice president and general manager of Trans-Pacific Container Corp.'s Long Beach operations, agreed that demand for clerks will drop. But Pisano said the reason for that employment drop will not be automation, but the fact that workers at other ports are more efficient than their contemporaries in Los Angeles and Long Beach.

"There probably won't be any big changes in the contract. The big problem we have here is the attitude of the clerks. Port Hueneme (Ventura County) and San Diego are starting to handle more of the shipments of autos coming in from Japan, England and Germany," Pisano asserted.

Unless the clerks and ILWU members in general start working more efficiently, the ports in Los Angeles and Long Beach will lose business which, in turn, will decrease the demand for clerks and longshoremen, Pisano added.

Trans-Pacific Container Corp. already has trimmed its non-union support staff in Long Beach to the bone, Pisano said.

"We have eight clerks working at the entrance gate and another five in the yard. We have to hire 10 additional clerks per vessel when we are loading or unloading," Pisano said.

But the number of clerks needed is now being greatly reduced through the use of electronic-data-scanning-and-transfer technology.

Use of such technology greatly accelerates the notification process, through which buyers and sellers are informed about cargo arrivals, the local experts said. The new automated technology also expedites bookkeeping and delivery, further reducing the need for maritime clerks.

As port-related companies adopt these new labor-saving technologies, the need for clerks, who traditionally have taken care of the notification process by phone and by mail, will be greatly diminished.

These clerks are represented locally by the ILWU. Consequently, companies planning to displace union clerks with automation must first forge an agreement with union negotiators, spelling out how quickly the clerk jobs will be phased out, said trade experts.

The move to automation will not reduce the need for longshoremen or foremen, Clemmons explained.

"In fact, we have seen a slight increase," in the number of longshoremen that belong to the union in that past two years, Clemmons said.

Banday of the ILWU said his superiors are scheduled to start structuring their new contract wish list before the end of March. The current ILWU contract, which stipulates a top hourly wage of $23.50 for clerks, was negotiated in 1990 and expires in July, he added.

Banday and Clemmons both said they do not think further automation will eliminate any of the 3,000 ILWU longshoremen jobs or the 250 foreman jobs at local ports.

Jerry Miller, manager of the economic development bureau for the City of Long Beach, though not familiar with the ILWU negotiations or possible clerk layoffs, said the jobs created by the foreign trade that passes through the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles reaches far beyond the ILWU.

"The combined ports directly generate 20,000 jobs in Long Beach, about 10 percent of the work force there. Throughout Southern California, foreign trade directly and indirectly generates 230,000 jobs," Miller said.

Increased foreign trade creates jobs in such areas as banking, insurance, freight and data processing, Miller added.

Yusen Terminals Inc., one of the top three terminal operators in the Long Beach/Los Angeles port complex, based on annual tonnage handled, has been automating for the past two years, said Ray Cunan, senior vice president. Cunan added that most of the company's 15-member, full-time staff is comprised of clerks who are members of the ILWU.

"When we have to load or unload, we have to hire 150 to 200 longshoremen. But we put in a call to the union hall for labor as our demand fluctuates. We don't keep them on as full-time employees," Cunan said.

By computerizing its notification process, Yusen has been able to handle freight more quickly. As ships are loaded and unloaded, buyers of the cargo are notified electronically at 15-minute intervals that their shipments are on shore and being transported to them by truck or rail, Cunan said.

"Almost all terminals have electronic invoicing, but some of them still send data to customers that their shipments have been received every two or three hours instead of every 15 minutes," Cunan said.

Quicker notification helps customers to more efficiently expedite the transport of their goods from the ship to their end destination by truck, rail or a combination of both, Cunan said.

But the automation has not eliminated any of ILWU jobs at Yusen, he added.

American President Lines Ltd. has experimented with a system that identifies each container by a code on a magnetic strip. Once the code on the container is scanned by the terminal operator, the code is sent to a computer. The computer checks the code on the strip, which identifies the containers' contents, and electronically notifies the customer that its shipment has arrived, Cunan said.

"This same technology (of scanning the magnetic strip) is used in New York and New Jersey on the toll roads. A driver gets an account number coded magnetically onto a strip on the outside of the car. The toll booths have scanners that read the strips and automatically charge a driver's account," Cunan said. He added that freight companies must universally accept the strip-reading system before it can be financially feasible for most companies.

"The international standards for the strip-reading system have already been set. But so far, the Sea-Land operation in Anchorage, Alaska is the only terminal that uses it," Cunan added.