ILA Longshoremen demand the return of a crane and Del Monte work. Click on the image to read the full article in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Placard-waving longshoremen urged the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority on Wednesday to hold to a strict Oct. 24 deadline for getting a cargo crane and the Del Monte Fresh Produce Co. ship deliveries moved back from Gloucester City to docks in South Philadelphia.
Packer Avenue Marine Terminal operator Astro Holdings Inc. and its president, Thomas Holt Jr., have asked for a 120-day extension – from receipt of a Sept. 24 letter – to respond and work cooperatively with the PRPA “through whatever concerns and issues they may have,” Holt said Wednesday.
Carrying placards outside the PRPA offices on Delaware Avenue, members of International Longshoremen’s Association Local 1566 said the extension request was “a stall tactic. It’s just dragging their feet,” said South Philadelphia longshoreman Kevin Carroll.
On Sept. 24, the PRPA, landlord of the Philadelphia port, notified Holt that the Del Monte fruit business should have been offered first to Packer Avenue Marine Terminal under terms of a 1991 lease, before going to the Holt family’s private terminal in Gloucester, because it amounted to new container business. In addition, a cargo crane that under the 1991 lease was to be at Packer Avenue, but is in Gloucester, should be moved here, the PRPA said.