Opposition to Port Clean-Air Plan Goes Into Higher Gear

Trucking companies are starting to take off their mitts to challenge the local ports’ clean-air plan, which would virtually eliminate all independent drivers picking up and delivering to the docks in the next five years.

At a California Trucking Association (CTA) meeting in Long Beach on June 1, trucking company operators wondered out loud whether the ports had the legal jurisdiction to implement their radical five-year plan, which would eventually replace old and dirty trucks with cleaner vehicles meeting 2007 air-quality standards. The plan is to be phased in starting Jan. 1, only seven months away. The trucking company owners didn’t outright threaten a crippling lawsuit, but a legal challenge was on their mind.

The California Trucking Association said it isn’t opposed to cleaning up the air, but its organization’s 2,300 members are opposed to being strong armed into hiring full-time employees rather than relying on independent drivers who own their own trucks.

“The ports’ proposals are prohibited under the federal Shipping Act,” said Patty Senecal, vice president of sales and marketing at Transport Express in Rancho Dominguez, Calif., which relies on some independent truckers to pick up and deliver cargo containers to the Long Beach and Los Angeles ports. “Taking legal action is the last-case scenario. The best-case scenario is for the ports to work out a comprehensive plan that brings in the motor carriers and does not put out of business independent truck drivers and small motor carriers.”

The trucking companies maintain that port trucks are engaged in interstate commerce because the cargo comes on ships arriving from outside California. Many trucks take cargo containers and transport them beyond the California state line. Interstate commerce is regulated by the Interstate Commerce Commission, the trucking association maintains, and not the ports.

Senecal warned now is the time for the ports to provide public assurance that their plan will pass legal muster prior to adopting the plan. Otherwise, a legal battle might ensue, further delaying any port clean-up.

But Port of Los Angeles spokesperson Arley Baker said the city attorneys in Los Angeles and Long Beach have done considerable research on this. “We feel we are on pretty solid ground in terms of setting the standards and conditions that are outlined in the clean-trucks program,” Baker said.

However, the ports have not publicly released their legal analysis and don’t plan to unless the matter heads to the courts, Baker said.

“We are still waiting for what a port legal analysis would say,” said Julie Sauls, vice president of legislative affairs at the trucking association, headquartered in Sacramento, Calif. She said the CTA wants to know what gives the ports the authority to tell trucking companies they have to hire full-time drivers rather than rely on independent operators who own their own rigs.

To get their point of view out to the public, the California Trucking Association recently retained Cerrell Associates Inc., a Los Angeles public-relations, political-consulting and issues-management firm that has worked with clients such as Occidental Petroleum and the Southern California Association of Governments.

Already trucking enterprises have convinced the ports not to limit the number of trucking companies allowed to serve the ports when the clean-air plan goes into effect. Initially the ports wanted to limit drayage activities to a handful of large trucking companies. Now smaller companies that prove they have the financial means to stay in business will get concessions to work with the ports.

Sweeping changes

In April, the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles unveiled a revolutionary Clean Air Action Plan mandating that the 13,000 to 16,000 trucks serving the ports must be retrofitted or scrapped for newer, cleaner models in a five-year program that begins next year. The cost of replacing newer trucks is estimated to be $1.8 billion, which covers 80 percent of the cost of a new truck and 100 percent of retrofitting 1994 or newer models.

The program is to be financed by port fees, state bond money and a per-trip charge of $34 to $54 on dirty trucks coming into the ports after January. Trucking companies can start applying later this summer and fall for concessions to serve the port and to get new trucks.

One issue stirring up the pot is this: How do trucking companies turn in old trucks if they don’t own most of the vehicles they use but rely on independent truck drivers to pick up cargo at the docks?

That question was addressed to Paul Johansen, assistant director of environment management at the Port of Los Angeles, who spoke at the meeting. He suggested trucking companies buy trucks from the independent drivers and then turn them over to the ports to be scrapped. “There will undoubtedly have to be a financial transaction between the concessionaires [trucking companies with the right to service the ports] and the owner/operators [of trucks],” he said. His comment was met with a universal groan by hundreds of people who packed a ballroom at the Hyatt Regency Long Beach.

That was one of many issues that still have to be worked out before the plan is adopted by port officials this summer.

The ports still haven’t come up with an economic impact analysis of how the plan will affect private business. Currently, there are about 1,300 trucking companies, large and small, licensed to operate in the port area.

“We are in the process of doing an economic-impact study over the next six to eight weeks, looking at costs to companies to convert over and employ operations,” said Baker of the Port of Los Angeles.

Currently the ports’ plan envisions fewer but larger trucking companies serving the docks because of the financial criteria needed to qualify for a retrofitted truck.

But Senecal and others pointed out that thousands of administrative and support jobs would be lost if smaller trucking companies go out of business.

Another concern is that the new program will reduce the number of truck drivers qualified to serve the ports, leading to a backup of cargo.

One effect undoubtedly will be higher fees to pick up and deliver cargo containers from the ports. Full-time employees cost more money. And the International Brotherhood of Teamsters is hoping to organize drivers into a union, which would result in higher salaries. Many independent truck drivers welcome the change because they would have steady employment, make more money and probably have some kind of health benefits.

California trucking companies are aligning themselves with a less radical clean-air program being proposed by the California Air Resources Board. That plan would also go into effect in January, but it would allow independent truckers to call at the ports.

The state program isn’t as aggressive as the port plan. It would reduce 85 percent of diesel particulate matter in the state by 2020 instead of the ports’ plan to reduce 80 percent of truck particulate matter by 2012.

“In a perfect world, we would like state or federal mandates imposed that would match what we need to do,” Baker said. “But our situation is we cannot grow or move forward with terminal expansion without our aggressive clean-air action plan.”