"Sometimes you have to re-organize the organized"
Raymond Ortiz, Jr., a native of San Pedro, California and a second-generation Longshoreman, has been an ILWU member since 1969, first working on the Princess Cruise Lines in the Caribbean. He has been a member of Los Angeles/Long Beach Local 13 for nearly four decades and is an expert in union negotiation and arbitration. Ray also brings to the Coast Committee his firsthand knowledge of the effects of globalization on organized labor. In the early 1990’s, he visited Mexico and observed the destruction of labor unions there due to the government’s privatization of the ports and workforce. He served as a delegate in 1998-99 at International Transportation Workers Federation and International Dockworkers Council conferences in the United Kingdom and Europe and also represented the ILWU in negotiations for union dockworkers in Japan at that time.
In 1999 and 2002, Ray served on the Longshore Division’s Negotiating Committee during its negotiations with PMA. He also provided important testimony at a May 2004 Harvard Business School conference on union-employer negotiations,
Prior to being elected and serving as California Coast Committeeman from 1997-2000, 2000-2003, and 2003 to the present, Mr. Ortiz served in the following ILWU Local 13, Los Angeles/Long Beach, California leadership positions: Southern California District Council; Executive Board; Trial Committee; Chairman of the Grievance Committee; Registration Committee; Labor Relations Committee; Night Business Agent; and Delegate to the Longshore Division Caucus.
Ray is an experienced interviewer with print and broadcast media, and can address such topics as the global effects of outsourcing on organized labor and union-employer negotiation and arbitration. He is married to Linda Palacios, (Local 63, Retired).
