Thousands of hotel workers in Southern California went on strike Sunday, calling for higher wages and better benefits in what the union is calling the largest U.S. strike in the industry's history.
About 15,000 members of Unite Here Local 11, which says it represents over 32,000 hospitality workers in Southern California and Arizona, across the Los Angeles and Orange counties are affected by the strike. Hotel workers are demanding a contract negotiation for higher wages, improved health care benefits, and stronger workplace protections.
Thousands walked off the job at more than a dozen hotels in downtown Los Angeles and Santa Monica, the union said on Twitter. Their contracts had expired at midnight on Friday at more than 60 hotels, including properties owned by major chains such as Marriott and Hilton.
Participates include cooks, room attendants, dishwashers, servers, bellmen and front desk agents.
"Our members were devastated first by the pandemic, and now by the greed of their bosses," union co-president Kurt Petersen said in a statement Sunday. "The industry got bailouts while we got cuts."
The work stoppage also comes at the beginning of the Fourth of July extended holiday weekend and a busy tourist season.
The strike, expected to last for several days, follows other industry strikes in Southern California with workers uniting to push for better pay and working conditions amid a surge in the cost of living.
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Hotel workers' negotiation at a stalemate
Unite Here Local 11 has been negotiating for a new contract since April. Last month, members voted 96% in favor of authorizing the strike. The union seeks a $5 increase in hourly wages, access to affordable family healthcare, higher pension contributions, and less strenuous workloads.
The union also wants to create a "hospitality workforce housing fund" to help hotel workers deal with the soaring costs of living in Southern California. Many union members said they live hours away and have to commute because they can't afford to live near their jobs.
Ahead of the strike, the union said the Westin Bonaventure Hotel & Suites, Los Angeles' largest hotel, "reached a historic agreement with its workers." The hotel is the union's biggest employer, with more than 600 union workers.
The tentative agreement provides higher pay, increased staffing levels, and affordable health care, among other benefits.
"With these extraordinary raises, I will no longer have to choose between paying my rent and putting food on the table for my family," Nancy Cerrato said in a statement. "We have given our lives to this industry. We deserve respect and to be able to afford to live in the city where we work."
But negotiations with other hotels reached an impasse as the union accused dozens of hotels — including the JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton LA Live, Beverly Hilton, Fairmont Miramar, and Anaheim Hilton — of continuing "to drag their feet after months of negotiations."
And a coalition of more than 40 hotels involved in negotiations alleged that union leaders canceled a scheduled bargaining session and refused to come to the table. The hotels have offered wage increases of $2.50 per hour in the first 12 months and $6.25 over four years, the group said.
"From the outset, the Union has shown no desire to engage in productive, good faith negotiations with this group," the hotel coalition said in a statement Sunday. "The Union has not budged from its opening demand two months ago of up to a 40% wage increase and an over 28% increase in benefit costs."
The group also expected the strike and Keith Grossman, a spokesperson for the coalition, told the Associated Press that the hotels are "fully prepared to continue to operate these hotels and to take care of our guests as long as this disruption lasts."
Busy tourist season in Southern California
Los Angeles has reached its highest levels of tourism since the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Los Angeles Tourism and Convention Board.
Last year, Los Angeles reported a "robust recovery reaching 91% of 2019 visitation levels" after about 46 million people visited the city. There was $34.5 billion in total business sales in 2022, impacting more than 528,200 tourism-related careers.
Tourists were expected to flock to Southern California for the Fourth of July weekend. The strike also coincides with Anime Expo, a four-day American convention that focuses on Japanese pop culture.
The event is held at the LA Convention Center and attracts thousands of people from around the world who stay at nearby hotels, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Labor fights call for better pay amid inflation, high cost of living
Across California, there is a shortage of affordable rental homes for extremely low-income households, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. Many low-income households are "severely cost burdened" and spend more than half of their income on housing, the coalition said.
Recent labor fights have focused on workers' rights violations and the high cost of living.
Hollywood writers have been on strike for about two months, the first industrywide strike in 15 years, demanding better pay and work protections. The New York Times reported that dockworkers had disrupted operations along West Coast ports for weeks over disagreements on wages until a tentative deal was reached in June.
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Contributing: The Associated Press
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