Baltimore dock workers watch, wait as leaders promise swift progress

If you bought a new car in the past two decades, there’s a chance Curnell Crockett drove it first.

“You name it,” said Crockett, 69. “If it comes off a ship, I drove it off.”

But right now, the longshoreman is worried about one truck: his black Chevy king cab and how he’s going to keep making payments now that the docks are quiet.

Crockett is one of thousands of dock workers who are now idle because one of the last cargo ships they loaded two weeks ago demolished the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, choking the pathway to their livelihoods. About $2 million a day in wages are at stake every day, Biden administration officials have said.

“I was supposed to be on that one,” said Sylvester Anderson, 62, who got a call to work on the cargo ship Dali that Monday, but turned the job down. “Maybe I should’ve taken it.”

The longshore workers are a critical link in the American supply chain that’s often forgotten.

We see the ships loaded with containers, we dodge the trucks on freeways and we greet the delivery drivers at our doorsteps, but every car, rubber duck, wrench and sundress that comes from overseas makes it onto U.S. soil thanks to the strong backs and steady hands of workers like Crockett and Anderson.

“America’s longshore workers stepped up with extraordinary measures, including working around-the-clock — 24 hours a day, 7 days a week — to keep the cargo moving,” President Biden said to dock workers on the west coast in a speech last year, thanking them for their hard work after the pandemic snarled the global supply chain.

Last year, our nation’s longshore workers double-timed it and deliveries across the nation were even quicker than before the pandemic. “Our dock workers did that,” Biden said.

And now, the thousands of workers near Biden’s home state are hoping he remembers them.

“We’re sending money to Israel and Ukraine and all over,” one longshoreman said. “Right now we need help right here. I hope they know that.”

There was a lot of anxiety and uncertainty in the gritty part of Baltimore’s port district this week, despite Biden’s visit on Friday and promises.

“I don’t know if everyone’s going to get the help they need,” said Crockett, eyeing the cluster of workers in a parking lot.

Guys with Popeye arms and worried faces were lined up outside a trailer the Maryland’s Department of Labor parked at the Steamship Trade Association’s offices.

It’s a mobile office with staff and 14 computer terminals to help dock workers navigate the muddy waters of unemployment insurance.

Work on the docks isn’t always steady.

These are some of the world trade’s first gig workers and largely still operate like that today — jobs ebb and flow along with the clip of port traffic.

And right now, there are none.

The workers gathered in dive bars, union buildings and port parking lots this week, uncertain they’ll get government assistance while crews work furiously to clear the tangle of bridge wreckage that is now submerged in the Patapsco River.

A lot of the workers were afraid to talk Monday, the union representatives all said “no comment” and everyone is nervous that their predicament will be forgotten and that the Army Corps of Engineers forecast that they’ll be able to clear the shipping channel by the end of May is optimistic.

However long the wait ends up being, it will feel longer.

Last year this was the busiest port in the nation for the transport of cars and light trucks, and it’s a hub for other types of vehicles and machinery, all of which can require specialized equipment and facilities to load and unload, according to the White House.

And that means older guys like Crockett and Anderson have a niche specialty.

Biden promised to acknowledge that.

Those sprawling parking lots you see full of new cars, the ones that Crockett lines up in neat rows, so ships can continue to roll the vehicles off, will be expanded at Sparrow Point, one of the only port areas still accessible around the bridge wreckage, according to the recovery plan Biden unveiled when he visited the port last week.

And about 1,200 longshore workers will receive lump sum payments that should equal between one and four weeks salary while crews scramble to resume shipping traffic, according to White House plans.

Crockett has reason to be skeptical of the promises. He gave his youngest years to Bethlehem Steel, which laid him off almost two decades ago without warning. He struggled to find the specialized gig at the docks and he’s nervous about reentering the job market at his age.

“Right now? Almost 70? My application will go straight in the trash,” he said. “This was supposed to be my last job.”

Anderson is worried for the younger workers supporting their young families. He said he’ll be fine until the jobs start back up.

He just retired from Johns Hopkins HealthCare, where he worked as a respiratory therapist in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. He’s got a pension thanks to that career, and the dock work has been just a side gig for him.

He’s going to miss the extra cash. His hardship during the unemployment comes in other ways.

“I’ve got a list,” he said, pointing to the bed of his Ford pickup, loaded with trash for a dump run, one of the many tasks he’s got on his “honey-do” list. “Oh, I’m going to keep busy.”