UNITE-HERE: Hotel Bel-Air Using Renovations To Bust Union

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.laborradio.org/node/12081

Submitted by Doug Cunningham on October 1, 2009 - 3:58pm


Is the Hotel Bel-Air using renovations as an excuse to bust a union? Jesse Russell reports:

A landmark Califoria hotel is shuttering its doors and laying off 250 union workers as it prepares to undergo two years of renovations. The problem for the union representing those 250 workers? The Hotel Bel-Air is refusing to rehire the workers in 2011 and UNITE-Here says they are using the renovations as a union busting tactic. The hotel offered workers a severance package that includes two weeks of pay for every year they worked at the hotel and six months of health care. UNITE-Here told the Los Angeles Times that the deductible on the health insurance plan is so high workers would not be able to afford them. In a statement the hotel said the offer was fair and final. A federal mediator will be brought in to oversee further negotiations. Hotel Bel-Air is operated by the Dorchester Company which closed the Beverley Hills Hotel in 1992 for a similar two-year renovation project. When that luxury hotel reopened it replaced 300 union workers with non-union employees.