Gov. Kathy Hochul won support from state lawmakers to create a waterfront commission to fight the kind of mob corruption made famous in Marlon Brando’s 1954 flick “On the Waterfront.”
Hochul beat back objections from the dock workers’ union to push through a new unit to replace the Waterfront Commission of New York Harbor — a joint venture with New Jersey that Garden State Gov. Phil Murphy pulled out of last year.
Murphy knocked the bi-state agency, founded in 1953, saying it was a relic that was weighed down by bureacracy and impeding port business. Jersey state police now oversee the port business on the other side of the river.
The International Longshoremen’s Association opposed Hochul’s plan for a new group, saying they should follow Murphy’s lead.
But Hochul prevailed with the legislature in the $237 billion budget deal, saying she did not want to return to the bad old days when the violent Mafia terrorized the New York docks.
“Governor Hochul is fighting crime wherever it occurs: on our streets, in our subways, and even on the waterfront. She promised to crack down on criminal activity by reinstating the Waterfront Commission — and she got it done,” said John Lindsay, the governor’s spokesman.
The new commission will be led by one commissioner appointed by the governor with the advice and consent of the Senate.
Like the prior comission, it will continue to conduct critical investigations into organized crime in the Port of New York, as well as ensure fair hiring practices that bar discrimination.
It will conduct background checks and license companies and people working in the cargo business at the port.
The commission will have the power to oust employees from the workforce who are found to have engaged in serious criminality and other violations.
“In 1953, the conditions under which waterfront labor was employed within the port of New York district were depressing and degrading…..resulting from the lack of any systematic method of hiring, the lack of adequate information as to the availability of employment corrupt and discriminatory hiring practices, criminal practices, and coercion of employees or employers,” the budget bill being voted on by the legislature states.
“Now, it continues to be in the best interest of the state to regulate activities within the port of New York district in this state to prevent such conditions and to prevent circumstances that result in waterfront laborers suffering from irregularity of employment, fear and insecurity, inadequate earnings, an unduly high accident rate, subjection to borrowing at usurious rates of interest, exploitation and extortion as the price of securing employment, a loss.”
Strict licensing and oversight of port workers will eliminate “oppressive, unlawful, discriminatory, and corrupt hiring practices,” the bill says.
The dock workers’ union, ILA 1814, said the legislature made changes that made the commission’s oversight more palatable.
“The breakup of the former bi state Waterfront Commission of N.Y. Harbor was an event that was avoidable. But because of the former Commission’s lack of transparency, ineffective oversight, and dictatorial powers over the method and manner of hiring new longshoreman workers, the old paradigm could not be sustained,” said ILA lobbyist James “Cadillac” McMahon.
“Both the Senate and Assembly ought to be commended for their leadership and commitment to our waterfront and we are grateful for their help.”
Under the revised law, the waterfront commission must conduct a review of its regulation and recommend changes within 180 days of its existence, after consultation with employers and unions.
The commission will be barred from suspending port workers who “without unlawful purpose” consult with known criminals, according to the ILA.
