« BlawgCoop Welcomes Divine Angst! | Main | Air America Coming to D.C. & Podcasting »
January 14, 2005
Congratulations D.C. Hotel Workers!
At the risk of turning ai into an “all congratulations, all the time” blog (see the past two posts and this one), congratulations to D.C. hotel workers who just won what sounds like a great contract offer from their employers! The D.C. members of UNITE HERE, “the merged union of hospitality, gaming, apparel, textile and laundry workers” which represents nearly half a million workers in the U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico, were ready to strike, which would have seriously messed with the plans of the nation's elite who are descending on D.C. next week for the 2005 inaugural. I guess now all the rich and famous Bush supporters will get to be pampered in peace and the management of D.C.'s finest hotels will be able to rake in the cash hand over fist w/out having to worry about any of those pesky “labor issues.” As the union reported:Sounds great to me!The tentative agreement ensures that there will be no work interruptions and the hotels will be able to proceed with all guest services for inauguration week as planned. The contract language includes new protections from workload increases, harassment at the workplace and other problems workers sought to improve. The economic package improves wages, pension contributions and maintains a strong health care package. Details will be released after members have read and voted on the contract.
Posted January 14, 2005 08:56 PM | general politics
One of the things they were trying to win was to get their contract in synch with other major hotel markets. Apparently, with the east and west coast having 2 different negotiation schedules, management was able to move their resources around to handle stoppages. This advantage would be lost if they were in simultaneous negotiations all over the country. I hope they won on this point, because it gets them future bargaining power.
Posted by: luminous at January 15, 2005 03:46 PM
