Author Archives for Ann Kammerer
On April 30, Local 355 President Rose Denis (above) traveled to Washington, D.C., to provide witness testimony at a hearing on TPS held by Congresswoman Jayapal. On May 20th, Local 355 member Romane Petit Joseph addressed Senate staff during a hearing held by Haitian faith leaders. Both testimonies highlighted the harm that ending TPS will inflict on union members, families, communities, and our economy. UNITE HERE members also rallied outside the Court with other labor unions and TPS advocacy groups.
We will continue to call on our elected officials to protect our members and our communities. As we have always known, TPS is a temporary solution, and we need real, comprehensive immigration reform. We will not stop fighting until we get there!
Local 26 MIT dining workers have ratified their new contract. In 2029, MIT cooks will make at least $41/hour. At Harvard, dining workers rallied to show that they are fighting together for a fair contract. Workers deserve better at the wealthiest university in the world!
On April 23, hundreds of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) lunchroom workers and supporters rallied at Daley Plaza and marched to the Chicago Board of Education. There, supporters stood in solidarity as lunchroom workers were arrested one by one outside the Board of Education, shining a light on the urgent need for the Board to end the inequality and settle a fair contract now. The workers had been without a fair contract for 10 months.
Lunchroom workers remain the lowest-paid workers inside CPS. The starting wage for lunchroom attendants is just $16.78, and many earn $22,000 less per year than custodial workers in the same schools. Nearly half of the surveyed CPS lunchroom workers report struggling to afford basic necessities like food and housing.
Maryland Governor Wes Moore wants to win a second term and has said that everyone deserves “a job you can raise a family on,” but some food service jobs at publicly-owned airports BWI Thurgood Marshall (BWI), Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA), and Washington Dulles International (IAD) are advertised as starting at minimum wage. On May 20 , BWI Airport workers went to Annapolis to deliver a message to Governor Moore: food service workers at state-owned BWI are struggling to get by on airport wages, and the governor has a responsibility to act!
SSP Food Service workers at Tampa International Airport won Union recognition last week with Local 362. After months of worker delegations to the company and denial of their right to organize, a strong committee of restaurant workers began a campaign. Workers organized diligently, steadily building people power until they successfully pushed the company to sign a labor peace agreement, certified their union, and won recognition for nearly 200 workers.
“This victory is about finally having a voice. We are the people who make the workplace run every day and we deserve a seat at the table. As coworkers coming together to build a stronger workplace for everyone, we voted for all our futures,” said Paul Lee Lipps, server at Duckey’s and new member of Local 362.
Last month, nearly 250 campus dining workers at two of Virginia’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Virginia State University (VSU) and Norfolk State University (NSU), officially won union recognition with Local 23. In late March, workers at both campuses called on their employer, Thompson Hospitality, to voluntarily recognize their union.
“I’m proud of the hard work and resilience it took for me and my coworkers to show Thompson Hospitality that, just like workers at all the other union universities, we deserve better wages and excellent healthcare at VSU. I personally can’t wait until the contract so that I can be able to pay my bills and still have some funds left over to go see my family in Louisiana!” said Nikita “Miss Nikki” Whitten, a cook for four years with Thompson Hospitality at Virginia State University.
Now, dining services workers at Hampton University have called on Thompson Hospitality to agree to the same fair process to recognize their union as it has followed at VSU and NSU.
Postdoctoral researchers (postdocs) at Yale University have voted 859 to 31 to join UNITE HERE Local 33! Postdocs are researchers, mostly in the sciences, who play an essential role in advancing work on everything from curing diseases to climate change to space travel. They work on one-year contracts, and a majority are non-citizens on short-term visas tied to their employment, putting them in an exceptionally precarious position.
The campaign was led by graduate workers who came forward through the experience of organizing Local 33. They went public in September 2025 after an underground phase that began in the spring of 2024, and headed into their election having built a committee of 250graduate workers and postdocs from around the world. Welcome to the union!
New York City hotel workers have announced a groundbreaking eight-year industry wide agreement that will provide years of financial security and stability for 27,000 of the city’s hotel workers. The agreement provides for guaranteed wage increases (the largest ever in the history of the Hotel and Gaming Trades Council), free family health benefits, pension contributions, and strong protections on the job. By the end of the agreement in July 2031, room attendants and other non-tipped workers will be earning over $100,000.
“Together, our union has made history with this contract and bettered the lives of our City’s hotel workers for years to come.” —HTC President Rich Maroko
The union contract between the New York City hotel industry and the Hotel and Gaming Trades Council (HTC) is set to expire on June 30. While NYC is home to more billionaires than anywhere else in the world, working people are struggling to afford an increasingly unaffordable city. Hotel workers are just asking for enough in their new contract to pay their bills and work with dignity. And the hotel owners can afford it!
If the industry does not agree to a fair contract well before the expiration date, it’s possible that there will be strikes, pickets, and lockouts at some NYC hotels.
“A labor dispute between the hotel industry and one of New York’s most politically active unions is spilling into public view – roping in prominent politicians along the way, underscoring the organization’s influence.” —excerpt from a recent Politico newsletter.
On April 16, the Culinary Union hosted a press conference to detail how Donald Trump’s policies have impacted Las Vegas’ local economy and workers. The press conference coincided with Trump’s visit to Nevada.
Culinary Union members fought hard to win strong contracts, but those gains are being undermined by an economy tilted toward billionaires while working families fall further behind. The Culinary is calling for policies that welcome visitors, respect workers, and strengthen the state of Nevada. They’re ready to keep organizing and fighting for a real course correction.
