Page 3 - Florida Sentinel 6-9-17

Feature
Ghost Workers Allegation At The Port Centers Around Company That Manages Cruise Ship Labor And Puts ILA 1402 Into The Mix
Any time the Black com- munity hears a report and the words International Long- shoreman Association, it auto- matically thinks, ILA Local 1402.
Why?
Because ILA Local 1402, founded and chartered on De- cember 3, 1935 by Mr. Perry Harvey, Sr., is one of the few predominantly Black organi- zations still in existence. Mr. Harvey’s goal was to promote the best interest of its mem- bers and their families; organ- ize workers and unite them to bargain collectively; to im- prove wages and hours of work; to help promote laws for labor, and generally to give men and women of color good wages, a pension and all other things necessary for union members to have a good life in the Jim Crow south.
However, the International Longshoreman Association is the umbrella for white unions working at the port, also.
Of course, the by-laws and methods used at Ports throughout the country has changed over time. Mainly be- cause equipment and technol- ogy has replaced manual labor.
It’s no more showing up at the docks trying to get work,
and getting paid at the end of the day. The method is far more complex and staged. Here is how it works:
ILA 1402 gets orders from the various companies at the port for the number of men needed. The jobs are placed on the board at its Union Hall. Workers with seniority get first pick of the jobs and are sent to the worksite. The Union hall prints out a sheet of workers for the jobs.
When the men arrive at the port, another union, The Checkers, is responsible for taking the payroll sheet and verifying the ILA 1402 worker is on- site, as well as checking the cargo. This union’s job is to clock the hours of the long- shoreman and report the hours to the head stevedore that works for the company that hired them. The head stevedore has the last say so in who’s working and submits the names to the company for payment.
The company generates and issues sealed checks to ILA 1402, and to The Checkers union with the workers name on it.
On Monday, News Chan- nel 8 aired a story alleging criminal activity within the In-
ternational Longshoreman’s Association. The allegation fo- cused on salaries being paid to people who did not actually work as longshoremen,aka ‘’ghost workers. ILA 1402 was featured in the reporting.
According to the story, there were, at least 10 “ghost workers” who received pay- ments for work they never did. The first allegation pertaining to the ghost workers was re- vealed in February, at a meet- ing of the Trustees for the overall association’s Pension and Healthcare Fund. The in- formation was brought forth by one of the trustees, Evan Cotton, a member of The Checkers local union.
On May 16th, the allega- tions that the ‘ghost workers’ issue was widespread at the Port of Tampa was forwarded to the International Long- shoreman’s union attorneys in Philadelphia. The letter re- quested an outside investiga- tion.
According to Channel 8, two of the alleged ‘ghost work- ers’ are a brother and sister team, Felix Santoya and Fe- licia Santoya.
Why this issue is important is because, in order to retain seniority, dock workers are re- quired to work at least 700 hours per calendar year. Their hours are tracked. That infor- mation is forwarded to Mus-
grove and Associates, a third- party company.
The list is given to the union to maintain seniority records. Cotton, said he no- ticed the names of people he didn’t know when he became a trustee in October. ILA 1402 has 300 men with union cards.
According to an article in the Tampa Bay Times, Cotton took his investiga- tion to another level and cross checked the names on social media and discovered that the names were linked to a former manager of Ceres Terminals, Inc., the company that handles all labor and cargo employment for the
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