ATA Fires Back At Enviro Groups' Lawsuit Against Port of Long Beach Truck Plan

The American Trucking Associations, which represent more than 37,000 member motor carriers nationwide, is dismissing a lawsuit filed by environmental groups alleging an agreement between the Port of Long Beach and the ATA will reduce pollution control plans as "baseless and inaccurate."

The settlement, agreed to in October 2009, removed portions of the port's Clean Truck Program that the ATA had objected to in federal court while still allowing the port to retain control over truck access to the port terminals. At the time of the settlement, these portions of the truck program were already under an injunction by a federal court.

"The settlement agreement between the ATA and Long Beach did not make any change that would reduce, let alone reverse, the port's progress in cleaning the air," said Clayton Boyce, ATA's Press Secretary and Vice President for Public Affairs.

"What is cleaning the air is the progressive banning of older trucks. The settlement agreement with the ATA gives the Port of Long Beach everything it needs, and everything it wanted, to continue banning older trucks. The port has the control. If the truck does not meet the requirements, the Port of Long Beach will not let it in the gate," said Boyce.

The National Resources Defense Council and the Sierra Club filed the suit against the Port of Long Beach last week, alleging that the port violated city laws in agreeing to the settlement and that the settlement will reduce the pollution controls of the truck program.

However, the ATA claims that neither issue is at the heart of the two groups' litigation efforts.

"The NRDC and the Sierra Club intend to force the Port of Long Beach (and every other port in the nation) to ban independent owner-operators in order to make all port drivers company employees who can be organized by the Teamsters," said Boyce. "The NRDC is lashing out in anger at the Port of Long Beach because it refused to ban owner-operators."

ATA To Seek Summary Judgment In Los Angeles Port Trucking Case

The ongoing lawsuit by the American Trucking Associations against a trucking program at the Port of Los Angeles could see some resolution next week, if a judge finds in favor of an ATA motion seeking summary judgment for portions of the suit.

The case began in September 2007 when the ATA sought an injunction to block the implementation of a truck program jointly developed but separately implemented by the neighboring ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles. While the initial moves for an injunction to prevent the truck program from being implemented in October 2008 failed, a federal court in March 2009 ruled that portions of the truck program likely violated federal law and thus issued an injunction on those portions of the plan until a full court hearing on the matter. In October 2009, the ATA and he Port of Long Beach reached a settlement, which removed the Long Beach port from the lawsuit. The Los Angeles port remains committed to fighting the suit and the full case is due before the court in March. The ATA motion for summary judgment is expected to be heard by the U.S. District Court on Jan. 11.

The ATA plans to ask the court to decide certain issues if there is no legitimate dispute as to the material facts surrounding those issues. The ATA is also planning to ask the court to find in its favor on the legal issue of whether the Port's Concession Agreement has a sufficient impact on motor carrier rates, routes and services to fall within the federal pre-emption provision.

The Concession Agreement, which forces motor carrier to abide by port-created rules to gain access to the port, is at the heart of the original suit by the ATA. The association alleges that the concession plan imposes a broad range of operational requirements that create a regulatory environment very similar to state intrastate economic regulation. The association has also argued that the plan would result in far fewer trucking companies being able to service the ports, reducing competition.

Long Beach City Attorney Rejects NRDC Appeal Over Truck Program

An environmental group's appeal to the Long Beach City Council seeking to overturn a negotiated settlement between the Port of Long Beach and the American Trucking Associations over trucking restrictions in the port was rejected out of hand Friday by the Long Beach City Attorney.

Filed early last week by the National Resources Defense Council, the appeal cited a statue of the City Municipal Code that allows the City Council to overrule decisions by the city's semi-autonomous Board of Harbor Commissioners. In the appeal, NRDC attorney David Pettit asked the City Council to overturn the settlement, which removed the port and city from an ongoing federal lawsuit by the ATA over the port's Clean Truck Program. The NRDC claimed that settlement so changed the truck program that the port commission should have conducted an additional California Environmental Quality Act analysis of program. The commission, in approving the settlement on Oct. 19, determined that the settlement did not require such an analysis.

City Attorney Robert Shannon did not address the CEQA issue in his rejection of the appeal, instead stating that the federal court which approved the settlement retains jurisdiction in the matter, and under the US Constitution federal primacy overrules state and local jurisdiction.

In addition, Shannon determined that the filing by the NRDC was not within the 10-day window required by the appeal process in the City Municipal Code.

Shannon also warned the NRDC that an additional appeal threatened by the group over a separate port commission ruling on the settlement would also be rejected out of hand for the same reasons.

The ATA lawsuit, scheduled to go before a judge in March, 2010, still seeks to block aspects of the neighboring Port of Los Angeles' version of the truck program.

LA Port Director Blasts ATA

Port of Los Angeles executive director Geraldine Knatz blasted critics of the port's decision to continue defending its version of the Southern California ports trucking program in a federal lawsuit brought by the American Trucking Associations.

Knatz's attack came in an open letter on the port's website in which she mocks the trucking association as being shortsighted.

The port's trucking program, developed jointly with the neighboring Port of Long Beach, seeks to cut diesel truck emissions by up to 80 by 2012. The Los Angeles plan, details of which were dictated to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa by International Brotherhood of Teamsters president James Hoffa, Jr., during a 2006 meeting, has been derided by the trucking industry as an attempt to unionize the port-servicing truckers.

The ATA filed sued in federal court to block certain non-environmental portions of the plan last year, eventually winning an injunction in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The ATA argued in court that the concession model adopted in the truck plan– where trucking firms would be required to meet ports-defined criteria to receive an access license to port property and in the case of Los Angeles be required to hire drivers only as employees– violated federal interstate commerce laws. Long Beach has since settled with the ATA and been removed from the litigation.

In her letter, Knatz defends the injuncted concession agreements, calling them "our enforceable agreements to hold trucking companies responsible for the trucks and drivers they dispatch to our port."

She slams the ATA for putting the port in a position as watchdog of the trucks.

"If problems arise with any of these thousands of contracted drivers or their trucks," she said, "the ATA wants the port to chase down those individual truckers– an enforcement measure that is neither practical nor realistic."

It is worth mentioning that the port already tracked down all of the drivers to give each of them encoded radio frequency identification devices, a task that neither overwhelmed or overburdened the port.

Knatz goes on to reiterate the position of former port commission president S. David Freeman who said during the development of the truck plan that the port only wanted to deal with trucking firms that had "deep pockets." In fact, the vast majority of trucking firms at the ports are the exact opposite– small firms with one to five drivers. To date at least 500 trucking firms that existed before the truck program began last October are no longer servicing the port.

Knatz also mentions slams the ATA for supporting the environmental goals of the truck program, a position the ATA has repeated numerous times, and then in the same breath slams the ATA members for taking ten's of millions in port offered incentives and grants to bring their fleets up to the ports environmental standards.

It is worth noting that by the port's own numbers there are approximately 4,000 new cleaner-burning trucks brought in to the drayage fleet since the truck program took effect.

With new trucks costing upwards of $100,000, this suggests that the industry has spent $400 million on the new trucks servicing the ports, while the port has contributed less than half of 1 percent of these funds.

Knatz concluded her letter by stating that the port would continue to defend against the ATA suit, which is scheduled to go before a federal judge in March.

"The Port of Los Angeles’ Clean Truck Program wasn’t designed to be a quick win and a one-shot deal," she said, "but rather a long-term solution for ensuring that our port trucking system will be environmentally clean, financially self-reliant and continually upgraded. And that’s a goal worth fighting for."