Revved up.(plan of the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach to reduce pollution from trucks)

BYLINE: BY BILL MONGELLUZZO

An ambitious but controversial plan of the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach to reduce pollution from trucks by 80 percent over the next five years is becoming more of a labor issue than a battle over environmental jurisdiction.

The ports' draft plan, which will be finalized in the coming month and implemented on Jan. 1, goes beyond the mandatory retirement of old, dirty trucks to require that only licensed motor carriers serve the harbor, and that the trucking companies hire drivers as direct employees.

Without rendering a definite opinion one way or another, Curtis Whalen, executive director of the American Trucking …