Labor & Employment Law

Workers Strike at Two Hilton Hotels

By James Parks

Striking hotel workers picket the Hilton Union Square in San Francisco.

Hilton hotel workers are getting gored twice by their Wall Street employer. First, the private equity firm Blackstone Group, which owns the hotel chain, received a $180 million debt bailout from the taxpayers–like hotel workers. Then the company turned around and claimed it could not afford to give workers a decent salary and working conditions.

Blackstone owed about $320 million in debt to the Federal Reserve, but persuaded the Fed to accept just $142 million in payment, sticking taxpayers with the bill for the remaining $180 million.

 At the same time, Blackstone is demanding an increase in the cost of emplyee family health care, a freeze on pensions, reduced staffing and increased workloads. Appalled by Blackstone?s blatant greed, workers at two of the largest Hiltons?Hilton Hawaiian Village in Honolulu and Union Square in San Francisco?walked out to demand a fair contract and the respect they deserve.

Debbie Tabar, an accounting clerk at the Hawaiian Village, summed up the workers? feelings this way:

I?m not out here just for me. I?m a taxpayer too and I?m twice as upset over what the Hilton has done. This is not just about hotel workers, it?s about the future of our community… They line their pockets with taxpayer money and now they want even more from workers by using the economy as an excuse to eliminate jobs, increase our workload and lock us into a permanent recession. To me, that?s just being greedy.

Some 1,500 members of UNITE HERE! Local 5 began a five-day strike at the Hawaiian Village today. Their latest contract expired three months ago. The strikers include housekeepers, dishwashers, cooks, bell staff, food servers, and others. With 3,600 rooms, the Hawaiian Village is the largest Hilton hotel in the world. For more information on the Hawaii strike, click here.

It?s been more than a year since the contract expired at the Hilton Union Square, the nation?s second largest Hilton hotel. Workers there, members of UNITE HERE Local 2, began a six-day strike yesterday.

Blackstone has  proposed the Union Square housekeepers clean 20 rooms a day, rather than 14, a 40 percent increase in workload. ?We call it the Dirty Room Program,? said Guadalupe Chavez, a 30 ?year housekeeper at Union Square.

They?ve already taken $180 million of our taxes and now they want us to subsidize them by lowering our standards at work and customers? standards for a clean hotel.

For more information on the San Francisco strike, click here.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on October 14, 2010 (boomark / email).