February 10,2009

Port ~ommissionS

F\O~

Meeting

Commission President Bill Bryant

Commissioner John Creighton

Commissioner Pat Davis

Commissioner Lloyd Hara

Commissioner Gael

Tarleton

Port of Seattle

27 1 1 Alaskan Way

Seattle, WA 98 12

Dear President Bryant and Port Commissioners:

On behalf of conservation, community, labor, business and other organizations in King County,

we applaud the Port of Seattle's leadership on the clean air issue, appreciate the staff effort in

formulating an implementation model, and request three changes for a more effective, sustainable

and

fair truck retrofit plan.

As you know, the Port of Seattle is currently developing a

plan1 to meet the 20 10 port truck

standards set under the Northwest Ports Clean Air Strategy in part to protect the health and safety

of the South Seattle communities, as well as the men and women who work at the Port itself. The

Northwest Ports Clean Air Strategy's standards for 20 10 would ban 400 of the most polluting

trucks now serving the Port of Seattle. The Port will require replacement of almost all of the

1,800 of the diesel trucks now in

drayage service by 2015. We believe a sustainable and

comprehensive strategy is needed to meet the port's clean air goals and we look forward to

working with you on that plan.

Three O~tions to Move to the 2010

and

2015 Goals

We strongly support current planning that aims to take the dirtiest hks off the road immediately

and welcome the idea of providing retrofit replacement trucks through Cascade Sierra Solutions

or another non

profit or government entity. This approach could work with any of the

implementation options now on the table to meet the 20 10 goals to ban pre

1994 trucks. The

three options as we understand them are:

a. Port of Seattle enters into voluntary agreements with the terminal operators to allow only

approved trucks through the terminal gates.

b. Port of Seattle requires all port trucking companies conducting business on Port of Seattle

property, through either concession or tariff agreements, to use approved trucks and business

methods, similar to the programs now used by the Port of Los Angeles.

The critical features of the current retrofit proposal are set out in grant proposals that have been submitted

to the state Department of Ecology, the Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources

Board.

c. Port of Seattle requires all port trucking companies to use approved trucks through a King

County, City of Seattle or State of Washington ordinance.

We urge the Port of Seattle to conduct a

hll, comprehensive community economic and

environmental analysis of the effectiveness, sustainability and fairness of these models before

committing significant resources towards implementation of the clean

air

standards for 2015.

Three Changes are Needed Now

There are three changes to the Cascade Sierra Solutions (or similar) retrofit proposal that we

believe are critical to ensuring that the Port of Seattle's clean trucks program for 20 10 is

sustainable, effective, and fair. These changes would meet our combined environmental and

community goals

outlined later in this letter:

1) Offer retrofit or replacement trucks leases to trucking companies rather than to drivers.

Under current economic and workplace conditions, individual trucking company workers will be

unable to bear the costs of leasing and maintaining replacement trucks

fiom Cascade Sierra

Solutions. Although these drivers are classified as

independent contractors,

truclung company

workers lack the power to pass the costs of clean trucks on to the trucking companies, the

shippers, or the buyers. The Cascade Sierra Solutions plan is actually an

economic disincentive

for truck drivers

requiring them to take on additional costs and debt or involuntarily forcing

hundreds of drivers out of their jobs. In the

end,

this plan may incentivize drivers to take their

polluting vehicles into other Northwest communities and will most likely waste taxpayer

funding.

Trucking companies,

comparison, are much better qualified to manage and maintain retrofit

trucks. Trucking companies have better access to credit, can pass costs on to shippers and buyers,

are able to reallocate resources, and are better able to manage risk and fluctuating cargo volumes.

Trucking companies will ultimately be more responsive to the maintenance requirements of

retrofit engines and are less likely to default or violate the

terms of a retrofit truck lease or

contract.

Trucking companies should be allowed to lease a retrofit truck for every driver on payroll who

turns in a pre

1994 truck for scrappage. (Some of the pre

1994 trucks are already owned by the

companies, who then lease them to drivers.) Most trucking companies will then probably sub

lease the retrofit trucks to their workers, but the trucking companies themselves will be ultimately

responsible for maintaining the trucks at peak performance levels and keeping them in

drayage

service. The trucking companies should also be required to hire, or at the very least contract with,

the drivers who turn in their trucks to avoid inadvertent displacement of current workers who

wish to remain in the

drayage industry. This is a more sustainable, effective, and fair way to

implement the Cascade Sierra Solutions model.

Ensure the buyback and scrapping of 1993 and older trucks; retrofit trucks from

Washington's

drayage fleet first.

The most effective way to remove the largest amount of diesel pollution is to take the dirtiest

trucks out of service and ensure that they do not reenter the marketplace. Merely banning those

trucks from the port docks will not work because drivers will probably take their trucks to other

communities in the region. The port's proposed plan must include the buyback of those trucks

estimated at about 400

and it must guarantee that they will be scrapped, not resold or shipped

overseas.

We also recommend that instead of spending $2,500 per truck to buy scrapped trucks

fiorn

California, the port's plan should include buying and retrofitting the many local 1998

2002

model year

drayage trucks now for sale by drivers who are trying to exit the industry.* Under the

current proposed plan, local trucks aged 1998

2002 would remain in the region, and continue to

decline, for another 5

7 years without pollution improvements.'

This

would

quickly

remove

more pollution from the region.

Mandate installation of more effective emissions control devices

The current plan calls for the use of flow through filters. Those (Level 2) filters capture about

50% of particulate emissions of the retrofit trucks and 0% of nitrogen oxide emissions. Diesel

particulate filters (Level

3),

however, capture at least 85% of diesel particulate matter and 25% of

nitrogen oxide emissions. Over five years, using Level

filters alone would reduce emission by

an additional

6.6

tons of diesel particulate matter and 0.9 tons of nitrous oxides per truck. We

understand there are concerns about which filters would work best for short

distance, low

speed

drayage. We encourage the Port to find solutions that would maximize pollution removal from

our communities, including the use of hybrid, electric and other diesel engine alternatives.

Our Shared Environmental and Communitv Goals

We believe we share with the Port the following goals for the effort to reduce air pollution for the

sake of our local community health as well

that of the wildlife in the Puget Sound basin:

Ensure that we meet the 2010 deadline for the benefit of the community health

Ensure that we maximize:

the sustainability of this program for the long term

regional air pollution gains

global

air

quality goals (including scrapping of the old trucks)

Ensure that environmental benefits are for everyone equally and fairly and do not unfairly

burden any one group of people

Buy backs and retrofits of local trucks would also allow drivers to exit the industry voluntarily; many

workers say they are stuck in

drayage because they owe money on their trucks and would much rather work

in another industry.

Unfortunately,

scenario under the Port's standards for 2010 would address the 1994

1997 trucks or

the 2005

2006 trucks until 2015.

With all of these improvements, the Port of Seattle can make progress towards significantly

reducing dangerous diesel pollution and greenhouse

gas

emissions from its activities in a

sustainable, effective and fair way. We urge you to direct the port's staff to incorporate these

changes into its plan before approving any clean air truck program.

Sincerely,

Linda

Anderson, Executive Board

Amalgamated Transit Union

David West, Executive Director

Center for a Changing Workforce

Michael Ramos, Executive Director

Church Council of Greater Seattle

Heather Weiner, Director

Coalition for Clean and Safe Ports

Jonathan Betz

Zall

Joyce Tseng, Board of Directors

Community Coalition for Environmental

Justice

Arsalan Bukhari, Executive Director

Council on American-Islamic Relations

Washington Chapter

Linda Orgel, Secretary

Friends of Grays Harbor and

Grays Harbor Community Alliance

Phil Mitchell

Greater Seattie Climate Dialogues

Sally Kinney, Co

chair

Interfaith Taskforce on Homelessness

Steve Marquardt, Research Director

Laborers NW Regional Organizing

Coalition

Lynn Domingo, Organizer

LELO: A Legacy of Equality, Leadership

Organizing

Sharon Lee, Executive Director

Low Income Housing Institute

Vince O'Halloran, President

Puget Sound Ports Council

Maritime Trades Department AFL

CIO

David Freiboth,

Executive Secretary

Treasurer

ML King County Labor Council

Dorry Elias

Garcia, Executive Director

Minority Executive Directors Coalition

John Littel, Political Director

Eric Franklin, Communications Director

Pacific Northwest Regional Council of

Carpenters

Will Parry, President

Puget Sound Alliance for Retired

Americans

Jerome Johnson, Vice President

Howard Greenwich, Research Director

International Longshore

Warehouse

Puget Sound Sage

Union

Kathy Fletcher, President

Nancy Quintero

People for Puget Sound

I beroamericana

Natalie Novak, Community Organizer

Dale Cannon, Business Manager

Real Change

Laborers Local

242

Lee Newgent, Executive Secretary

Seattle Building and Construction Trades

Council

Brady Montz, Seattle Chair

Sierra Club

Sergio Salinas, President

SEIU

Local 6

Dagmar Cronn, Member

South Park Neighborhood Association

Chuck Eggert, Secretary

Treasurer

Teamsters Local 231

Tracey Thompson, Secretary

Treasurer

Teams ters Local 11

Justin (Buck) Holliday, Secretary

Treasurer

Teamsters Local 690

Rick Hicks, Secretary

Treasurer

Teamsters Local 174

Steve Chandler, Secretary

Treasurer

Teamsters Local

Ken Troup, Secretary

Treasurer

Teamsters Local 589

John Emrick, Secretary

Treasurer

Teamsters Local 3 13

J. Allen Hobart, President

Teamsters Joint Council 28

Diane

Zahn,

Secretary

Treasurer

UFCW Local

Rick Sawyer, Secretary

Treasurer

UNITE HERE Local

Jim Woodward, Sub District Director

United Steel Workers District 12

John

Jones, Jr., President

Washington ACORN

Maru Mora Villalpando, Lead Organizer

Washington Community Action Network

Laurie Valeriano, Policy Director

WA Toxics Coalition