The largest ferry workers’ union in the state declared a strike on Wednesday, July 24, leading up the Southeast Alaska State Fair this weekend.
“We don’t want to strike. We want to support the communities. We want to go to work. We’re just workers. We want to do our time and go home,” vice president of the Inlandboatmen’s Union (IBU) Robb Arnold said. “But, well, we have some valid concerns.”
Arnold said the IBU initiated the strike Wednesday during ongoing negotiations with the state of Alaska, when the government missed a 2 p.m. deadline to respond to their latest offer. “They have not called us back,” he said.
At 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday DOT Commissioner John McKinnon told the CVN “The AMHS will continue to operate unless the IBU employees decide to strike.”
At 2:20 p.m, a picket line formed in Ketchikan, after IBU workers walked off the Columbia ferry. Arnold said a picket line will form in Juneau Wednesday evening, when the Malaspina docks, and he expects picket lines as workers walk off the Aurora and Tustumena ferries in Valdez.
Fair attendees traveling by ferry, along with vendors and some musical acts, will be unable to travel should ferry service be interrupted, said Southeast State Fair Executive Director Kari Johnson. She said when news of the possible strike broke, she arranged travel for the headliners through Alaska Seaplanes and Harris Air.
“Once we heard, we got them on a flight. The headliners are making it. The attendance stress is still there,” Johnson said of fairgoers who booked a Thursday or Friday ferry to Haines.
Sarah Lewis, with the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service, said she is working to arrange travel for 43 4-H youth who need to get back to Juneau on Sunday.
“We did just start experiencing an influx of calls within the last hour,” Seaplanes manager Zach Tarleton said on Wednesday afternoon. “Dispatch is adding as many additional planes and seats as possible.” Seaplanes general manager Carl Ramseth said that the company is in the process of adding seats to its eight scheduled flights each day, plus adding additional flights to meet demand. Harris Air did not respond by press time.
IBU represents about 430 members and is the largest ferry workers’ union in Alaska. Ketchikan’s KRBD Community Radio reported Tuesday that a strike on that scale, “would immediately shut down sailings for at least half a dozen vessels.”
Amidst deep cuts to the Alaska Marine Highway system, IBU has rejected what it calls “the package of harsh measures proposed by Governor Dunleavy’s administration,” including canceling 28 negotiated settlements, no wage increases over five years, one-year contracts, instead of the three-year contracts they had been getting and several others.
“We are going to stand up for our communities and our workers,” Arnold said during a press conference Wednesday. “(DOT) refused to meet with us… we’ve been treated horribly.”
In a statement on Tuesday, DOT’s MacKinnon said, “Our offer, in context with other labor contracts, is fair on economic terms…This is the busiest time of year for the Alaska Marine Highways and a shutdown of the ferry system will impact residents, visitors and commerce.”
Though the IBU has called out the administration as a reason for going on strike, Governor Dunleavy’s office provided no additional statement beyond McKinnon’s statement.
Haines tourism director Carolann Wooton said, “I certainly hope that something would change… a lot of people come to big events with the ferry.”
About 10,000 people traveled to and from Haines by ferry last July and August, according to numbers Wooton provided.