Mayor Baraka led a march and rally yesterday in demonstration against the hiring disparities reported at Port Newark & Elizabeth.
Marchers gathered at noon demanding that the Waterfront Commission, the New York Shipping Association, and the International Longshoremen’s Association do more to remedy severe racial, gender and ethnic inequality in employment at the Port and an apparent bias against the hiring of local residents.
“Port jobs have an enormous potential to boost the economies of Newark and Elizabeth, two cities struggling with high unemployment and underemployment. Port jobs can be an important source of well-paying middle class jobs. Yet, clearly, those hired to work at the Port are not representative of the diversity of the surrounding community,” said Mayor Baraka. “International Longshoremen’s Locals 1 and 1804-1 both have fewer than 6% Black members and under 13% Hispanic members. Local 1804-1 has no women. The Port is located in one of the nation’s most diverse communities. Newark and Elizabeth have a combined Black and Latino population of 77%. The two locals remain segregated despite years of attempts by the Waterfront Commission, civil rights organizations and the City of Newark to desegregate the Port,” he added.
A 2015 report that stated that of the 3,299 registered longshore workers at the Port, only 299 (6.3%) had Newark addresses and that of the 3,299 workers, 2,055 are white, 787 Black, 410 Hispanic, 17 Asian and 30 others. Only 302 were women. Most of the Black workers (523 of 787) come from the predominantly Black I.L.A. Local 1233.
In March of this year, Mayor Baraka sent letters to both Venita Gupta, head of the Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice and US Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez requesting that they thoroughly investigate the extent and causes of inequity in hiring for jobs at the Port of Newark and Elizabeth and “act to remedy severe racial, gender and ethnic inequality in employment at the Port and an apparent bias against the hiring of local residents.” He also asked the Attorney General to determine whether federal Civil Rights laws have been violated.
In the video below Mayor Baraka speaks to demonstrating residents, marches with them to port facilities, and blocks trucks from entering and leaving port. He vows that the demonstrations will continue and larger port shutdowns will occur until ILA and NY Shipping Association end hiring discrimination against minorities and Newark residents.
Photos and video courtesy of City of Newark Press Office
