Truck drivers for Los Angeles and Long Beach ports are striking again on Monday over claims of abusive and illegal working conditions.
The weeklong strike will include roughly 100 drivers with the Teamsters union Local 848 who for years have been trying to persuade the city-run ports to hire them as employees, instead of independent contractors.
Truckers have gone on strike 14 other times in the last four years.
“Trucking companies have lured drivers into abusive truck lease schemes and failed to pay them for time worked, resulting in driver strikes disrupting port operations and causing congestion,” a news release from Justice for Port Truck Drivers said.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Union Secretary-Treasurer Eric Tate said Thursday at a press conference that workers are upset with the ports for allowing “greedy corporations to continue to exploit hard-working men and women through abusive and often illegal contracting-out, misclassification, temporary staffing and wage theft schemes.”
The union has also voiced concerns over the ports’ recent pact to move toward zero emissions because the agreement does not address the effects on truck drivers. Drivers took on most of the cost, Tate said, when the Clean Trucks Program was launched in 2008.
