Newark Activists March On Port, Demand 'Desegregation': PHOTOS, VIDEO

Newark, NJ – A coalition of Newark city leaders marched on the Port Authority of NY/NJ facility in Elizabeth on Monday to protest alleged racial, gender and ethnic inequality in employment at Port Newark, one of the largest and busiest in the nation.

Marchers gathered at noon at 132 Corbin Street, Building 1200 in Elizabeth to demand that the Waterfront Commission, the New York Shipping Association, and the International Longshoremen's Association “do more to remedy severe racial, gender and ethnic inequality in employment at the Port and an apparent bias against the hiring of local residents.”

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka issued a news release in March calling for a federal investigation into the “extent and causes of inequity in hiring for jobs at the Port of Newark and Elizabeth.”

• See related article: Newark Mayor To Feds: Port's Labor Unions Are 'Segregated'

"Port jobs have an enormous potential to boost the economies of Newark and Elizabeth, two cities struggling with high unemployment and underemployment,” Baraka said Monday. “Port jobs can be an important source of well-paying middle class jobs. Yet, clearly, those hired to work at the port are not representative of the diversity of the surrounding community.”

Baraka continued:

"International Longshoremen's Locals 1 and 1804-1 both have fewer than 6 percent black members and under 13 percent Hispanic members. Local 1804-1 has no women. The port is located in one of the nation's most diverse communities. Newark and Elizabeth have a combined Black and Latino population of 77 percent. The two locals remain segregated despite years of attempts by the Waterfront Commission, civil rights organizations and the City of Newark to desegregate the port.”

Attendees and supporters of Monday’s march included: the Newark Municipal Council, Deputy Mayor of Workforce Development and Employment Rahaman Muhammad, Manager of Port Activities for the City of Newark Al Turrick Kenney, and several community partners including the clergy, the Newark Branch of the NAACP, the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice (NJISJ), the Newark Anti-Violence Coalition (NAVC), YDI Youth Build and the People's Organization for Progress.

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Photos/video by the City of Newark Press Office