San Francisco hotel workers vote to strike today

By Erica Holt, Bay City News Service

August 24, 2006

SAN FRANCISCO (BCN) - Hotel workers from 13 San Francisco hotels will vote today on whether to authorize their union leaders to call a strike, the Unite Here Local 2 union reports.

Local 2 reports that it called for a strike vote to bring an end to a more than two-year contract negotiation process between the union and the San Francisco Multi-Employer Group, the entity bargaining for hotel management.

A new round of negotiations began in June, according to Local 2, but have yet to yield a breakthrough.

The contract for hotel workers expired in 2004, the union reports, and in September of that year, the union commenced a two-week strike at four hotels. Workers were subsequently locked out by all 14 hotels involved in the bargaining process for more than seven weeks, according to the union, which began a boycott of the hotels that continues today.

The 14 hotels were the Westin St. Francis, the Crowne Plaza, the Fairmont, the Palace Hotel, the Omni, the Four Seasons, the Grand Hyatt, the Hyatt Regency, the Hilton, the Holiday Inn Civic Center, the Holiday Inn Express and Suites Fisherman's Wharf, the Holiday Inn at Fisherman's Wharf, the Mark Hopkins and the Argent.

The union reports it ended its boycott of the Westin St. Francis in September of 2005 after its management agreed to key contract provisions, but the hotel continues to be represented by the Multi-Employer Group.

The Argent hotel has since changed ownership and opted out of the Multi-Employer Group, but workers from the 13 other hotels will be voting today.

Outside of the Bay Area, Unite Here reports that hotel workers in Monterey and Hawaii voted on whether to authorize a strike Wednesday and on Monday and Tuesday, its hotel workers in Chicago voted to authorize a strike.

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