[Linganth] Newsom threatens to picket hotels / Mayor applies pressure to force cooling-off period

[P. Kerim Friedman]

The AAA is prominently featured in this SF Chronicle article (scroll
down). We have already scored a major victory by helping UNITE gain the
support of the city. Now we just have to plan better so that the AAA
can respond better to situations like this in the future. If you want
to take part in these discussions, please join AAA UNITE's e-mail list:

To join the list, send an e-mail message to
<aaaunite-subscribe at yahoogroups.com>. You will receive a confirmation
message. Just reply to this message and your subscription will be
complete.

Or visit our web site:

<http://aaaunite.blogspot.com/>

Where you can read the latest statement by AAA UNITE's Robert O'Brien
here:

<http://aaaunite.blogspot.com/2004/10/unite-here-and-anthropologists-
claim.html>

It is still up in the air where the conference will be held. To learn
what each of the AAA's sub-sections are planning to do if the AAA moves
to Atlanta, read this post:

<http://aaaunite.blogspot.com/2004/10/sub-section-mini-meetings.html>

Kerim Friedman, on behalf of the AAAUnite Ad Hoc Committee

---------------

<http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/10/26/
MNGFB9G8UI1.DTL&type=printable>

Newsom threatens to picket hotels
  Mayor applies pressure to force cooling-off period
  - Steve Rubenstein, George Raine, Chronicle Staff Writers

  Tuesday, October 26, 2004

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom threatened Monday to join hotel
workers on their picket lines today unless hotel owners end a four-week
lockout and allow employees to return to their jobs for a 90-day
cooling-off period.

  Newsom gave the owners of 14 hotels until 2 p.m. today to respond to
his request. If they refuse to go along with the cooling-off period,
the mayor said he will seek to have the city stop doing business with
the hotels and call for a public boycott.

  "I will do everything in my power to see to it that the city and
county of San Francisco does not do business with those hotels, and I
will extend that in multiple ways because I am very intense about
this,'' Newsom said. "We have people who are suffering out on the
streets, and in turn the image of the city is suffering.

  "You will see me take actions to represent my disappointment not just
in the proceeding days and months but years. Even when the strike ends
(the hotel owners) will have sent the message that San Francisco is
dispensable as a city and its employees can be used as pawns, and I
will not forget that and I will act accordingly."

  Mayoral spokesman Peter Ragone said the mayor could join pickets as
early as this afternoon.

  The union representing 4,000 locked-out hotel workers -- cooks, room
cleaners, bartenders, bellmen, servers and others -- said they are
willing to return to work for a 90-day cooling-off period.
Representatives of the 14 hotels involved in the labor dispute said
they would give the mayor an answer by his deadline.

  "We understand the mayor feels strong about this,'' said Barbara
French, a spokeswoman for the hotels. "We have his request under
advisement.''

  Newsom proposed the cooling-off period in a letter Sunday to Mike
Casey, president of Local 2 of the hotel workers union, Unite Here; and
to Mark Huntley, president of a group of 14 San Francisco hotels that
is negotiating labor contracts, the Multi-Employer Group.

  The two are locked in a tense labor dispute that led to a two-week
strike against four of the hotels that began Sept. 29 and to the
eventual lockout of the employees of all 14 hotels -- more than 4,000
in all. Contract negotiations have been fruitless.

  Newsom initially called for a cooling-off period earlier this month,
but that request was rejected by hotel owners who said they would allow
workers back only if the union agreed to drop its demand for a two-year
contract. A two-year contract would expire at the same time as
contracts for hotel workers in other major cities, giving the San
Francisco union more leverage in future negotiations. The hotel owners
want a five-year contract.

  Another of the contentious issues in the dispute revolves around
health care benefits. The hotels want workers to pay more for health
insurance. For the past 20 years, hotel workers have paid $10 per month
toward their health insurance. Hotels want workers to pay $32.53 a
month in the first year, rising each year to $273.42 per month in the
fifth year.

  Newsom's remarks Monday came at the end of a news conference he gave
with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to illustrate their bipartisan support
of Prop. 1A, a state ballot initiative aimed at preventing the state
legislature from taking local tax revenues.

  "The hotels now have gotten their two weeks in after the two-week
strike, '' the mayor said. "Fair is fair," he said. "As far as I'm
concerned, you're even. Now let's all grow up and get back to work."

  In his letter, Newsom said the continued dispute "causes significant
disruption to the citizens and visitors of our city, and it threatens
to interfere with San Francisco's economic recovery.''

  The four hotels that the union originally struck were the Argent, the
InterContinental Mark Hopkins, the Hilton and the Crowne Plaza Union
Square. The workers were locked out of those four plus the Fairmont,
Four Seasons, Grand Hyatt, Holiday Inn Civic Center, Holiday Inn
Express & Suites Fisherman's Wharf, Holiday Inn at Fisherman's Wharf,
the Palace Hotel, Hyatt Regency, Omni and Westin St. Francis.

  The dispute has already caused the organizers of one major convention
to consider moving elsewhere. More than 5,000 delegates of the American
Anthropological Association scheduled to meet Nov. 17-21 at the San
Francisco Hilton might instead meet in Atlanta. Organizers of the
convention said Monday they want to learn the response to Newsom's
request. The Hilton is one of the four hotels where workers struck on
Sept. 29 and one of the 14 where the lockout continues.

  Casey wrote to Newsom on Monday saying the union would agree to send
members back to work from Wednesday through Jan. 25 while negotiations
continue. Casey said the return to work would be unconditional and the
union would negotiate on all outstanding issues.

  Spokeswoman French said Monday the 14 local hotel managers met to
discuss the proposal and are discussing it with their own companies.

  "The hotels believe the solution is an agreement'' reached at the
negotiating table, she said. "They appreciate and respect the mayor's
continued involvement.''

  Ultimately, Newsom's authority in the matter is limited to his power
of persuasion and the prestige of his office, but San Francisco's
losses could be considerable in a prolonged labor dispute. The
cancellation of major conventions -- and the subsequent loss of tourist
dollars -- is still possible.

  The American Anthropological Association made reservations for its
2004 annual meeting at the Hilton eight years ago, said Elizabeth
Brumfiel, the association president and professor of anthropology at
Northwestern University. On Friday, she and the group's executive board
sent an e-mail to members saying that, because of the labor dispute,
the board had voted to move the meeting from San Francisco to the
Atlanta Hilton, Dec. 15-19.

  On learning Monday morning of Newsom's overture, the group suspended
those plans pending the response from both the union and the hotels,
said Brumfiel. Monday, she e-mailed members telling not to cancel or
make new reservations until it's decided where to hold the meeting.

  The group sides ideologically with the union, and Brumfiel has written
that "anthropologists cannot, in all good conscience, meet in
facilities whose owners are using the lockout of low-wage workers as a
bargaining tactic.''

  The group had a legal vulnerability, too, as breaking the Hilton
contract would expose the members to potential damages of $1.2 million
-- the fee for renting the hotel facilities. The association and Hilton
worked out a tentative compromise, said Brumfiel -- go to Atlanta, a
nonunion hotel, this year but return to San Francisco in 2006.

  However, Debbie Larkin, a spokeswoman for the hotel, said, "Our
understanding is that (the anthropologists' meeting) is still going to
be here. ''

  By calculations of the San Francisco Convention & Visitors Bureau, the
5, 000-plus anthropologists would probably spend $3,093,750 in the
city.

  Chronicle staff writer Wyatt Buchanan contributed to this
report.E-mail Steve Rubenstein at srubenstein at sfchronicle.com and
George Raine at graine at sfchronicle.com.

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