An unknown group of political, environmental and labor activists pulled a bit of a prank on some attendees to the American Association of Port Authorities annual convention being held this week in Seattle.
On Monday, copies of a three-page fake agenda for the entire conference were slipped under the doors of all 900 rooms at the Seattle Westin Hotel, where the event is being held.
The slickly produced faux agenda accurately recreated the style of the conference's real agenda and listed fake events at the conference focusing around the activists' perception of environmental, social justice and economic abuses by ports and their leadership.
The fake agenda touted such conference events as "The 'Green Washing' of the Cargo Supply Chain Award," "Wall Street on the Waterfront," and "Panicking Over Panamax: Lessons in Leveraging the Panama Canal."
The main targets of the fake agenda were the issues of port drayage drivers, the high salary of Seattle port CEO Tay Yoshitani, and accusations that ports are not doing enough to improve port-area environments.
The AAPA trade group represents the port authorities of more than 150 ports in the Western Hemisphere. The annual conference, celebrating the group's 100th year, runs through Thursday.
