LONGVIEW — Longshoremen returned to the railroad tracks near a Columbia River grain terminal with union members’ wives and mothers Wednesday, blocking a shipment and facing more arrests in their battle for jobs.
Two union officers and about 10 of the women were detained, International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 21 President Dan Coffman said in a statement. Coffman was among those involved despite a judge’s repeated orders that the union not block entrance to the site.
Law enforcement officers brought a massive force to various parts of the railroad tracks, including two tactical vehicles, canine units and about a dozen personnel in full riot gear. At least two protesters were treated after being hit with pepper spray, and the train eventually made its way into the EGT Development facility.
Union leaders decried the law enforcement activity, saying it amounts to a private security force paid for by taxpayers. “Longview Longshoremen stood down from their jobs for 30 minutes in silence as a unit train rolled into EGT under the escort of police paid for by the very workers in the community of Cowlitz County that the company is undermining and exploiting,” Leal Sundet, ILWU Coast Committeeman, said in a statement.
The actions appeared to defy the National Labor Relations Board and the orders of a federal judge who has already held the union in contempt and is considering fines for previous actions. The ILWU believes its members have the right to work at the new $200 million terminal. EGT has hired another firm that is staffing with workers from a different union, Oregon-based Operating Engineers Local 701.
EGT hopes to establish the terminal on the Columbia River as a top West Coast location for shipping grain to growing markets in Asia.
“This grain delivery is an important step toward completing the facility’s testing phase and bringing it online. Nevertheless, the ILWU’s actions are in direct defiance of the law and the ruling of a federal judge,” EGT CEO Larry Clarke said in a statement.
About 200 people have been arrested in demonstrations this summer at the terminal. In the largest a couple of weeks ago, several hundred blocked a train shipment in Vancouver and Longview. That demonstration also led to a clash with authorities, and an attempt by police to arrest the union’s leader was blocked when the huge crowd surged forward. Authorities say hundreds returned to the site overnight, stormed the terminal, held security guards and damaged rail cars.
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