By Gary Gentile
The Associated Press

LOS ANGELES - A maddening backlog of import containers at West Coast ports has many U.S. retailers upset that toys, televisions and other goods are not moving fast enough from ships to shelves.

"There are an awful lot of Christmas presents sitting out on those docks," said J. Craig Shearman, spokesman for the National Retail Federation.

While dock workers returned to the job last week after a two-week lockout, shipping line officials said longshoremen are delaying the unloading of container ships onto trucks and trains.

Acknowledging that goods are not moving at their normal pace, the union representing 10,500 longshoremen at 29 major West Coast ports said shippers caused the slowdown, partly by closing the ports in the first place. They also are not providing the necessary equipment to unload ships, the union says.

"For us, it doesn't matter what the reason," Mr. Shearman said. "The fact remains the goods aren't coming into the stores as quickly as we need them."

Exporters also are being hurt. Many worry that if the slowdown persists and a required cooling off period ends with another lockdown or strike, customers in Pacific Rim countries will start to look elsewhere for goods.

Orange and grapefruit growers are especially concerned their exports to Asia for the Chinese New Year, which begins Feb. 1, could be held up. Navel oranges will be ready for shipping at the end of December and early January, just as the cooling off period ends.

"If a strike happens then, it would be very disruptive," said Russ Hanlin, vice president of International Sales at Sunkist Growers, a marketing cooperative.

The Pacific Maritime Association, which represents shipping companies and port terminal operators, and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union have been engaged in contentious contract negotiations since spring.

The acrimony between the two sides culminated in a lockout of dock workers Sept. 29. The shipping lines accused the longshoremen of a work slowdown, but the union said it was working according to safety regulations, which slowed the pace of work.

The 10-day lockout, estimated to cost the nation's economy about $1 billion a day, ended Oct. 9 after a judge ordered the West Coast ports reopened.

When the lockout ended, about 200 container ships were docked or anchored off the Pacific coast. At the busy ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, many of those ships remain stuck in the backlog.

This week, the shipping lines filed documents with the U.S. Department of Justice accusing longshoremen of a deliberate slowdown since returning to work. They said longshoremen are working 34 percent below the normal work rate in Oakland and 9 percent less at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach. Other slowdown rates cited include 29 percent in Portland, Ore., 27 percent in Seattle and 19 percent in Tacoma, Wash.

The figures compare the number of containers moved on and off a vessel each hour at a particular port before and after the lockout.

The union blames the gridlock on unsafe working conditions and disorganized terminal operators.

On Friday, union officials said they had filed documents with the Justice Department rebutting the association's claims of a slowdown.

The delay in unloading ships even affected the World Series.

As part of a promotion sponsored by Master Card, about 57,000 disposable cameras were supposed to have been given to fans in San Francisco Wednesday night.

The cameras, shipped from Hong Kong, are in a container on a ship that arrived at the Port of Los Angeles on Oct. 15. The small company that ordered the cameras has been told the ship won't be unloaded until Nov. 1.