Supporters and opponents address proposed changes to labor law.
Supporters of a bill that seeks to improve working conditions for about 25,000 port truck drivers in California rallied outside the capitol in Sacramento Tuesday prior to a hearing by the state Senate’s Judiciary Committee.
The supporters, including the Teamsters, complain that drayage drivers are misclassified as independent contractors and are exploited, while many trucking companies say that their drivers prefer to work as independent contractors.
“I am representing thousands of port truck drivers who are working under poverty level,” said Daniel Uaina, a driver who introduced speakers at the rally. He said misclassified drivers work for companies that own the trucks they operate, but that drivers still have to pay for fuel and other expenses when “these expenses belong to the company.”
“The company have carved out wages, they have carved out the dignity of drivers,” he said.
Senator Ricardo Lara, who introduced the legislation, SB 1402, said the expenses truckers are charged are so high sometimes that drivers “are essentially working for free.”
A summary of Lara’s bill explains it would require California’s Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) to post on its website a list of port drayage motor carriers with any unsatisfied final court judgments or other outstanding debts resulting from labor violations.
Customers that use a port trucker on that list would be “jointly and severally liable with the motor carrier for future unpaid wages, unreimbursed expenses, damages and penalties, including applicable interest, found due to any and all commercial drivers provided, directed or used by the motor carrier to perform port drayage services for the customer, or that are found due as civil penalties to the state, as specified.”
Several organizations wrote to the committee to oppose Lara’s legislation. The Western States Trucking Association said it “would decimate this industry by imposing potential liability on customers utilizing owner-operators, which would certainly have the effect of discouraging the use of owner-operators.”
“This is unwise on a policy level as the independent contractor model provides many unique advantages to Californians in the workplace,” the association said, adding that those advantages include the opportunity for drivers to be their own boss, earn more money and maintain a flexible schedule.
The California Trucking Association (CTA) opposes the bill and said the DLSE “has systematically abused its authority in determinations where it has found drivers misclassified.” The bill should “should outline a process for being removed from the DLSE list” and a provision to exempt companies from the joint and several liability provision if the employees are covered by a “bona fide collective bargaining agreement” should be removed.
The CTA said a study it developed with the Inland Empire Economic Partnership found that in 2013, “independent owner-operators studied earned a median net income of $59,478 compared to $42,078 median pay of employee drivers in California” and that “three-quarters independent owner-operators earned more than drivers in employer-based models. The top 20 percent of independent owner-operators earn more than workers in 156 of the 158 logistics occupations in Los Angeles County and the Inland Empire, including those with bachelor’s degree.
CTA also noted that attempts to simply ban independent owner-operators from the ports, have failed and accused the DLSE of abuse and exploitation of the so-called Berman hearing process, administrative proceedings for resolution of wage claims under California law.
Speaking before the committee, Lara said the bill “is not automatic liability. A trucking company needs due process and an opportunity to pay what is owed before it appears on any list. SB1402 comes in only when a company has exhausted its appeals and is still refusing to satisfy its obligations to workers.”
He called it a “fair approach and something that could transform the cargo industry and particularly for our port truck drivers.”
Geoff Terrill, president of Toll Global Logistics, said he supported the bill. His company has 80 employee drivers and and what he called a “constructive relationship with the Teamsters.”
With 800 drayage companies operating in the ports Los Angeles and Long Beach, he said, “the competitive challenges we face are made even more difficult when Toll must compete with a vast array of trucking companies that do not abide by the same rules. Unfortunately, it seems that many of the companies we compete against operate under an independent contractor business model that runs afoul of California labor laws, resulting in unacceptable working conditions for many port drivers.”
David Pettit, a senior attorney with the National Resources Defense Council, told the committee that the employment status of drayage drivers was an environmental issue because with the sophisticated emission control systems on trucks, “drivers often do not have the money to maintain the trucks the way they ought to.”
Drayage drivers rally in California
