Ports Delay Container Fees for 24th time

The ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach delayed their proposed container dwell fees again on April 22. This was the 24th time the ports have delayed these fees since announcing them in October 2021. If they were to be implemented, the ports would charge ocean carriers fees starting at $100 per day for empty containers left on the docks longer than nine days.

Rachel Campbell, media relations manager for the Port of LA, said there is no benefit to delaying the fee.

“[H]owever, it was effective,” Campbell said in an email. “We saw a decline in import dwell 9 days and over by almost 50% since Oct 24. The threat of the fee has been impactful.”

Janet Gunter of San Pedro Peninsula Homeowners United, INC. has doubts that the fee will ever be implemented.

“In my view, this is nothing more than a publicity stunt that makes the port look like they are going to try and control something that they are obviously not intending to really put any backbone behind,” Gunter said. “It makes them appear as if they’re doing something, when in fact, I don’t think they ever really intended to.”

Gunter said the Port of LA is doing what it typically does.

“They put out these messages, these grand statements and pronouncements,” Gunter said. “They use these catchphrases that make headlines and appear like they’re doing something terrific, when in fact it’s just par for the course, it’s par for their image.”

When asked if the fee would be canceled entirely, Campbell responded by saying it was still listed under the tariff portion of the Port of LA’s website.

“Reducing the number of aging containers in the terminal improves velocity,” Campbell said. “The dwell fee is in place to keep the terminals fluid to handle the incoming vessels.”

Both ports said their executive directors would consider implementing the fees on April 29, after monitoring data for a week. This is far from the first time they have said this.

The Port of LA will charge $100 per day for each empty container left for nine days, but will increase that amount by $100 every day, according to a document on the port’s website detailing the tariff. If an empty container were to stay for 15 days, the port would charge the carrier an accumulated $1,500. There is no upper limit.

However, this is all contingent on the port actually beginning to charge these fees.

On April 1, the Port of LA implemented another long-delayed fee, the clean truck fund rate. Despite its misleading name, this fee charges for trucks that are not clean — zero emissions trucks are exempt. The port charges $10 for every twenty-foot equivalent unit that enters or leaves any container terminals.

“[The] Clean Truck Fund rate resolution was approved in March 2020, with rate collection anticipated in about 12 months,” Campbell said. “This was delayed approximately one year because of uncertainties in the market place due to COVID.”

Campbell said that the clean truck fund rate and container dwell fee are unrelated.

Jesse Marquez, executive director of the Coalition For A Safe Environment, said the clean truck fund rate does not go far enough.

“Our organization has always supported that there be a container fee, to be able to offset the various types of mitigation impacts,” Marquez said. “What had been recommended by us, and by several studies in the past, had been a fee in the $100 to $200 range per container.”

The port is not honoring these wishes with trucks, but will instead potentially charge this amount for empty containers. Gunter said this is because there’s a lot more money in the shipping industry than the trucking industry.

“These shippers have made millions of dollars from the COVID thing,” Gunter said.

Gunter said the port has not been clear as to what the collected fees will be used for.

“The bottom line comes back to the impacts on our community from all of this, and the fact that this money could go a long way in assisting to mitigate environmental impacts,” Gunter said. “But they’ve never said where that money was really going to go. So, if it goes back to the port, in the port coffers, that of itself is meaningless.”

According to a press release by the port, “Any fees collected from dwelling cargo will be reinvested for programs designed to enhance efficiency, accelerate cargo velocity and address congestion impacts.”

Gunter argued that the money collected from the container dwell fee should be used to help the surrounding areas.

“If they’re going to do something with the money that makes sense, then that would be a great thing to do,” Gunter said. “But we’ve never seen any constructive dialogue on how if they ever did collect the money — which again, I believe is a disingenuous publicity stunt — that they would ever do that.”