(The following article by Jon Ortiz was posted on the Sacramento Bee website on May 6.)
SACRAMENTO — The effects of a three-day strike by independent truckers continued to be felt by Northern California businesses Wednesday, although some companies were reporting eastbound trucking in the Stockton area had resumed under terms of an agreement brokered Tuesday.
Some truckers in San Joaquin County returned to work Wednesday morning, including Youbert Betady, who had been a spokesman for the independents during the weeklong strike in Lathrop, just south of Stockton.
“I couldn’t afford to be off work any more,” Betady said by cell phone from his truck. “I need the money.”
Anger over California diesel fuel costs and stagnant hauling fees touched off the truckers’ protest. The independents, who are private contractors for freight companies, pay for their own fuel. What they are paid to haul products had not increased even as diesel fuel reached record highs in California.
Betady, who hauls products out of Lathrop for Oakland-based trucking firm Tristar Express N.C. Inc., said that the company had made some concessions, including a 15 percent increase in its shipping rates and 5 percent on top of that to offset fuel costs that reached a new high on Wednesday. The average cost for a gallon of diesel fuel was $2.38 a gallon, 33 cents per gallon more than on April 5 and 58 cents more than one year ago, according to AAA.
However, Betady stopped short of calling the new terms a settlement.
“(The work stoppage) isn’t over,” Betady said. “There are still people who haven’t come back. They want more.”
Tristar Express co-owner Asdrubel Groschel, who has taken a lead in talks with the truckers, said the Valley freight companies reached a deal to boost hauling fees and fuel reimbursements.
“It appears that we have reached a workable solution. Most of our guys are out working,” Groschel said. “The vast majority are saying, ‘We like what we’ve got, let’s go to work.’ I mean, who wouldn’t like to get more than 20 percent for a raise?”
Union Pacific spokesman John Bromley confirmed that eastbound truck traffic had resumed at UP’s Lathrop railyards, but that trucking to and from the Port of Oakland – the nation’s fourth-busiest shipping point – has slowed to a crawl.
Oakland’s woes are hurting businesses like Sacramento-based Blue Diamond Growers, which is losing about $2.5 million in export shipments to Asia and the Pacific Rim each day the port remains slow.
“There’s been no change from Tuesday,” said Blue Diamond spokeswoman Susan Brauner. “There’s still violent behavior and drivers remain reluctant to drive past demonstrating protesters.”
In Fremont, officials at the NUMMI auto plant said the Oakland slowdown still threatens to halt manufacturing. The joint General Motors Co. and Toyota Co. plant relies on just-in-time inventory control, which can leave it vulnerable to supply-chain hiccups.
On average the independent truckers earn between $8 and $9 an hour after expenses – including fuel – to haul goods, according to figures supplied by the Teamsters union. Because they are not employees, antitrust laws bar them from formally organizing to address grievances as unions do.
Port of Oakland officials announced a tentative agreement between the truckers and the port on Tuesday. According to the agreement, a committee will be formed and meet quarterly to hear truckers’ complaints and attempt to resolve them.
But because the drivers do not have elected representation, it was not clear that the deal would get Oakland truckers back on the road.
Driver Ruben Lopez said that “a deal to make a deal” wasn’t enough to get him behind the wheel.
“We’re still on strike,” Lopez said via cell phone late Wednesday afternoon as he stood near the entrance to the port’s APL Terminal. “We’re looking for a serious increase in the hauling rate. If we don’t get that, we’ll stay here as long as we have to.”