Danny Glover, John Edwards Rally with Hotel Activists for Workers' Rights

[paineinthearse]

http://boston.indymedia.org/feature/display/53872/index.php

Are we so disenfranchised that nobody knew about this event beforehand? This forum is getting disturbingly quiet.

Does anyone know if this event was on the dems dispatch or www.massdems.org calendar?

Did anyone receive notice from John Edwards or other source?

Danny Glover, Sen. John Edwards Rally with Hotel Activists for Workers' Rights
by Talia Whyte

21 Feb 2006

Boston area hotel workers came out strong at the Ritz Carlton Hotel to hear Senator John Edwards, actor/activist Danny Glover and other union leaders speak on workers’ rights last Saturday. The speakers were part of the “Hotel Workers Rising,” one of several nation-wide events to support increased benefits for hotel workers, part of the nation’s fastest growing labor industry.

Boston area hotel workers came out strong at the Ritz Carlton Hotel to hear Senator John Edwards, actor/activist Danny Glover and other union leaders speak on workers’ rights last Saturday. The speakers were part of the “Hotel Workers Rising,” one of several nation-wide events to support increased benefits for hotel workers, part of the nation’s fastest growing labor industry. In 11 US cities, union contracts for many of these workers will expire this year. The hotel industry has witness immense consolidation and expansion over the past few decades and now employs 1.3 million workers. While sales in the hotel industry are reaching back to pre 9/11 numbers, hotel workers are not reaping the benefits.

There are over 5,800 hotel workers who are members of Local 26 who work for 17 different hotels in the Boston area. The average pay of these workers is $13.50/hr and many of them receive no benefits, pensions or retirement plans. The average hotel worker is responsible for cleaning 16 rooms a day, spending only twenty minutes per room. Union activists say that this is too much work for so little money. Activists are particularly concerned about the so-called ‘heavenly beds,’ which are larger, heavier beds that can be found in higher end hotels. Because of the size and number of sheets for these beds, unions say that more time is needed to clean than the allotted twenty minutes.

<snip>

Senator John Edwards ran his 2004 presidential campaign on the message of “Two Americas,” one for the rich and the other for the working poor. Edwards said that the national minimum wage should be raised so it would be easier for the working poor to cross into the middle class. “Over the next decade there will be more jobs created,” he said. Will these jobs have benefits? Will we strengthen the middle class? Or will more people join the 37 million living in poverty. We will give these hotels the opportunity to do what’s right. If they don’t do it, we will make them do it.”

Photography by Alexis Winter


See also:
http://www.hotelworkersrising.org

[merbex]

1. One possibility for the quiet:last week was school vacation week

[Kat45]

2. I knew about this, and I think I learned about it on DU.

IIRC, there was an ad on the Lobby page about Edwards work with hotel workers; maybe I clicked on it, I don't remember.

[paineinthearse]

3. Edwards forum

I had a PM with a regular in the Edwards forum, says he had posted something in GEN.

Another reason to post location-specific events in that state's forum.

[Kat45]

4. Maybe I saw it in the gen forum?

I don't know.