Aramark workers at Georgetown University are celebrating their first union contract. After months of negotiations the bargaining committee and the company reached an agreement that was ratified on March 1. This first contract includes big improvements to workers’ health insurance and substantial raises.
"Contract negotiations is an experience I’ll never forget,” said Dante Crestwell, a Georgetown dining worker and member of the negotiating committee. “It showed me how much a determined and dedicated group of people standing up to the company and not backing down can do. We won with the help of Georgetown students, who fought alongside us and supported us from the very beginning.”
Congratulations to Georgetown Aramark workers on their first union contract!
Aramark workers at the Consol Energy Center, home of the Pittsburgh Penguins, have won a new contract. Members of UNITE HERE Local 57 voted overwhelmingly to approve the agreement on February 24.
The new agreement brings significant improvements to contract language covering scheduling, seniority, and gratuity, all of which are important issues for stadium concessions workers.
"It took a long time to get here with all of us union members standing together, but it was certainly worth it," says Consol Center worker Tom Manna. "We’re very satisfied with the contract and excited for the future."
Oakland, CA – Castlewood Country Club workers and UNITE HERE Local 2850 will join hundreds of religious leaders, students, union members, and participants in Occupy Oakland and Occupy San Francisco for a mass march through Pleasanton to Castlewood Country Club on Saturday, February 25th, at 9:30 am in protest of their two-year lockout of workers. The march will depart from Civic Park in downtown Pleasanton (corner of Main Street and Bernal Ave) and will continue along First Street/Sunol Boulevard to Castlewood Country Club (Castlewood Drive between Foothill Road and Pleasanton-Sunol Road).
Amidst the national outcry against the United States’ growing economic inequality, Castlewood workers are taking to the streets to protest the elite golf club’s two-year lockout of its food service staff. They will be joined by longtime allies and new activists inspired by Occupy Wall Street.
"Chase Bank took away my home in the foreclosure crisis. Castlewood took away my job and my health care in the lockout. Working people won’t have anything left unless we stand up for ourselves. Us Castlewood workers realized that two years ago, and now people all around the country are fighting back too," said Maria Ramirez, a Castlewood janitor.
"Many of Castlewood’s member-owners spent $25,000 for their memberships," said Ann Worth, a longtime union member and participant in Occupy Oakland. "They can justify spending that kind of money to play golf, but they still think it’s okay to squeeze more out of the people who work for them for $10 or $12 an hour. They expect workers to subsidize their expensive game by giving up affordable health care for their kids. It’s a perfect example of what’s been going wrong in this country: the rich are getting richer by denying everyone else their share in the American Dream."
Workers at Rosewood Hotel Georgia, which opened in downtown Vancouver in July of last year, ratified their first contract on February 7th. This is the first new hotel to join Local 40 in almost 15 years. The old Hotel Georgia shut its doors in 2006, was sold, and remained closed for more than four years. It reopened as a new, 156 room luxury hotel. The new owners appeared determined to operate it non-union, but the mobilizations of union hotel workers fighting their city-wide contract in 2010 provided strong encouragement for the new company to negotiate. Local 40 accomplished a card check-like recognition agreement and recall rights for any of the former employees who wanted to return.
The ratified contract raises Hotel Georgia workers close to the standard and cycle of the top Local 40 hotels.
(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO) With bright orange buckets and loud, cheering voices, Unite Here Local 23 hit the streets with a colorful bang last night as this newly-formed local held its first rally. Workers from cafeterias across the DC area marched and chanted, beating out rhythms on the bucket drums. As a light drizzle began to fall, the group gathered together and individual workers stepped up to the megaphone. “I was born here, I was raised here, and I’ll die here” said Leon, a cafeteria worker in the District. “We all need to stand united so we can get what we need.” Mary, a restaurant worker, said she was there to show her solidarity for the workers who were headed into contract negotiations, because her workplace also would be in negotiations soon. “We want the same support we’re giving you because we’ve got to let them know we mean business!” she said, as the surrounding group cheered. Emilio Abate, Local 23 Staff Director, closed out the rally, reminding everyone that it was just the beginning and encouraging workers to “take this fire back to the cafeterias and organize!” – report/photos by Julia Kann with Washington DC Metro Labor Council.
On February 3, US District Court Judge Timothy M. Burgess granted a 10(J) preliminary injunction as authorized under the National Labor Relations Act, ordering the Sheraton Hotel in Anchorage to recognize and bargain with UNITE HERE Local 878. This order was wide-reaching and included many significant issues for the workers at the hotel, which is owned by Ashford and operated by Remington Lodging and Hospitality. The judge ruled that Remington has engaged in a wide range of unlawful activities, including:
Unilaterally assigning non-union security work to bargaining unit members.
Failing to notify the FMCS of the existence of a contract dispute and provide 30 days’ notice prior to making unilateral changes.
Using Employer handbook rules to preclude workers from exercising section 7 rights under the NLRA.
Disciplining, suspending or discharging workers for engaging in protected Union activities.
Confiscating Union buttons.
Prematurely declaring impasse and failing to negotiate with the Union.
Coercing workers into signing a petition seeking to decertify the Union.
Denigrated the Union in the eyes of workers.
Improperly withdrawing Union recognition.
Making unlawful unilateral changes in workers’ terms and conditions of employment.
The Judge’s order directed Remington to:
Recognize and bargain with the Union.
At the direction of the Union, return to the Union medical and pension benefits.
Reduce the room quota for housekeepers from 17 to 15.
Start paying for employees’ meal breaks.
Stop charging employees for meals.
Follow seniority scheduling practices.
Allow the Union and its representatives access to the hotel.
Within 20 days, hold mandatory employee meetings and read the Judge’s order to employees, or in the presence of management, have an NLRB Agent read the document.
The struggle with the Anchorage Sheraton began in December 2008, and since that time the employer has attempted to put up every possible obstacle to the workers achieving a fair contract. While the struggle continues, this is a major victory for the members of Local 878.
This decision stems from two complaints issued by the NLRB General Counsel against Remington. A third complaint is scheduled for hearing later this month, and the NLRB is investigating approximately 30 additional unfair labor practice charges filed by the Union.
UNITE HERE Local 54 members in Atlantic City have overwhelmingly voted to approve a new contract with the Gold Nugget Atlantic City. Under the three-year agreement workers will continue to receive free family health care and an employer-sponsored pension. All workers will receive at least one wage increase over the course of the agreement with additional increases triggered by company revenue increases.
This is the first contract Local 54 has negotiated with the new owners of the Golden Nugget and it covers almost 600 cooks, housekeepers, bartenders, cocktail servers and other hospitality workers.
On December 2, 2011, Pomona College fired Carmen, her mother Felipa, and her brother-in-law Rogelio after a meticulous investigation into their work authorization documents. Now, Carmen and the Pomona community are speaking out in a new video.
Pomona is a college, not a greedy corporation. This was not an ICE raid. A federal agency did not prompt this investigation. So why did Pomona check workers’ papers now? The firings come in the midst of workers’ efforts to form a union – an effort Pomona College has opposed.
Your name will be added to a petition calling on the college to allow the dining hall workers to choose to unionize without intimidation from the college.
Carmel. Workers from the Pine Inn and Tally-Ho Inn walked off the job today, Wednesday, February 8, in a two-day strike. As corporate profits soar and the economy rebounds for the rich, workers are striking in protest of management’s demand to eliminate longtime employer coverage of family health insurance.
The 28 Workers are asking to maintain health care coverage for their 29 children and 13 spouses. Pine Inn and Tally-Ho Inn workers, members of UNITE HERE Local 483, have been without a contract since January 1, 2011. The workers are housekeeping, bell, front desk, and maintenance employees. Currently, Pine inn housekeepers make less than $25,000 a year in wages.
The hotels’ wealthy owner, Richard Gunner of Fresno, has not said he cannot afford to pay for family healthcare coverage, only that he does not want to. Gunner also owns the Santa Barbara Inn, Gunner Ranch vineyard in Fresno, as well as real estate and a number of development projects in the Santa Barbara and Fresno areas.
"This is another case of the rich squeezing workers and our families," said Jose Vigil, a Pine Inn houseman of three years.
The workers are also protesting over alleged violations of workers’ rights by management. Last week, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Office of the General Counsel stated that it did "not condone the Employer’s conduct" in briefly surveilling and writing down the names of participants at a union rally in November. The Office put Pine Inn on notice that any further violations of workers’ rights during the next six months would lead to formal proceedings against it.
The dining hall workers had been at Pomona College for years, some even decades. For a few, it was the only job they held since moving to United States.
Then late last year, administrators at the college delivered letters to dozens of the longtime employees asking them to show proof of legal residency, saying that an internal review had turned up problems in their files.
Seventeen workers could not produce documents showing that they were legally able to work in the United States. So on Dec. 2, they lost their jobs….
For the last two years, many of the dining hall workers had been organizing to form a union, but the efforts stalled amid negotiations with the administration. Many on campus believe that the administration began looking into the employees’ work authorization as a way to thwart the union effort, an accusation the college president, David Oxtoby, has repeatedly denied. But that has done little to quell questions and anger among the fired workers and many who support their efforts to unionize.