Hyatt workers at the May 26, 2010 protest outside the Hyatt Regency in downtown Chicago. (José M. Osorio/Chicago Tribune)
About 30 people, including a priest, protesting working conditions in front of the Hyatt Regency were arrested by police Thursday in a staged act of civil disobedience.
Annemarie Strassel, a spokeswoman for Unite Here Local 1, said 200 workers had been prepared to be arrested, but out of respect for slain Police Officer Michael Bailey’s wake Thursday evening, the union agreed to lower the number of demonstrators so that officers will have time to attend the wake.
Thousands of other hotel workers in 15 cities protested Thursday as well and just over 800 arrests were expected.
In Chicago, hotel workers peacefully marched down Stetson Avenue and onto the street in front of the Hyatt Regency Chicago, where they linked arms and sat side by side in the middle of the road. Wearing signs, the workers chanted, “We are human beings. Enough is enough.”
Labor contracts affecting 6,000 downtown hotel workers expired 11 months ago, and labor negotiations so far have been unsuccessful. While the contracts affect workers at several hotel chains in Chicago, Unite Here has focused its efforts on Chicago-based Hyatt, controlled by the Pritzker family, holding it up as an example of a hotel chain that is using the economy as an excuse to take advantage of workers.
Thursday’s demonstration was the third major Hyatt protest in two months by Unite Here in Chicago. Workers at the Hyatt Regency briefly walked off the job in May and picketed outside the hotel — the largest in Chicago — citing unsafe working conditions for housekeepers.
In June, at Hyatt’s first shareholders’ meeting as a newly public company, shareholders faced protesters and dozens of religious leaders who compared the company’s labor practices with Pharaoh’s enslavement of the Israelites. Some of those religious leaders were among those demonstrating Thursday.
In September, about 200 union and hospitality workers were arrested in Chicago to show support for ongoing labor negotiations and for fired hotel workers in Boston. The arrested protesters sat in the middle of Chicago Avenue as an act of civil disobedience.
Susan Tynan, a server at the Park Hyatt Chicago and one of the protesters Thursday, said the demonstration is about “respect” for workers.
“Of course I feel bad for the industries that are struggling,” she said. “But I am not in one of those industries. …We’ve been busy every day.”
While Hyatt is proposing salary freezes and benefit cuts, she said, executives are getting raises.
“We make the hotels a lot of money,” she said.
Hyatt Regency Chicago issued a statement Thursday, saying workers currently receive no-cost health care, no-cost pension, holiday pay, vacation days and sick days and earn an average entry-level wage of $15 per hour, the company said. The hotel is asking that in the new contracts, workers be asked to contribute toward their health care, and frozen salaries are also on the table.
“Hyatt Regency Chicago wants to continue to take care of our employees, and we want them to continue to enjoy working here,” the company said in a statement. “However, we also must take into consideration the current economic conditions.”
John Schafer, vice president and managing director of the Hyatt Regency Chicago, said the company is an easy mark for the union. It was business as usual inside the hotel, where a large conference by the United Federation of Doll Clubs was being held.
“The union strategy is to divide and conquer,” he said. “We’re an easy target. We’re Hyatt. We’re the local kids, and we’re the biggest hotel in the city.”
Schafer said workers at the Regency are treated well and that huge pension increases amid a difficult climate for the hotel industry means that business as usual is no longer realistic. He said the adjustments Hyatt has called for in contract negotiations seem reasonable. Meanwhile, he said, a call for 21 job openings yielded 1,200 applicants.
“If the word on the street was that this was a bad place to work, would 1,200 people be lining up for a job?” he said.
quit whinning; you should be glad you have a job.
Did they pay non-union wages to the protesters?
@muscles [citation needed]
I’m graduating from college in about two weeks. I’ve been looking all over the country for employment in my field. The best I can find are unpaid internships that, according to the US Dept. of Labor (http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/whdfs71.pdf), appear to violate the law. I have roughly $80K in student debt to pay back, most of it to the fed. gov’t. I am currently unemployed; given the hours of my last classes, I simply haven’t been able to find steady work at all. So, someone please explain to me why $15/hr is terrible pay, or how the working conditions are so awful?
This is not a skilled trade. They do not have skills that they’ve spent years learning. Most of the workers are not highly educated, and many probably aren’t educated, period. While it is true that an economy needs service workers, that doesn’t mean that unskilled service workers should be paid the same (or more!) than, say, a registered nurse.
I’m a liberal, but I think that you (the union, plural) are barking up the wrong tree. If unemployment was 3%, I’d support you. I’d support you at 6%. But when it’s nearly 10% (…and considerably higher when you consider that the unemployment rates don’t account for people that have been out of work so long that they simply give up…), you’ve gotta be kiddin’.
They’ve all got big grins on their faces in the accompanying picture…they must not be THAT unhappy! Also, why don’t they find out just exactly HOW MUCH their employer is paying for their insurance? They just MIGHT BE surprised! But oh, NO…that wouldn’t make any difference to some greedy pigs!!! Unions do serve a purpose, but NOT when you’re already making out like a fat rat in a cheese factory and DEMAND more!! NO WONDER a lot of companies move to the South!!
One of the poorest reporting jobs across the board. Simply put, protesters marched on the Hyatt hotel chain and caused a disruption to traffic and pedestrian flow.
Ok, why? Union issues, poor working conditions, “low” wages. Great, ambiguity at its finest. Union issues; means nothing. Poor working conditions; based on what? A national standard, or a “union” standard? What’s the comparison? “low wages”; again, based on what?
If the union worker wants more, what is the union worker doing (other than protesting) to show that it has earned more? Where is the accountability at the worker level?
Mary, you are right on!!
Great, about a million more union nits should turn out to give Princess Penny Pitzker and her left wing, scum bag nickle nosed family (Hyatt hotel owners), a giant pain in their worthless cans.
They couldn’t do enough to help give us this vomit excuse for a president, who now pees on the Constitution, dailey.
I was witness to this demonstration. I get the feeling that many of these people are not even legal. I would guess that 25% of hotel work force is here illegally. It would be interesting to see what would happen if Immigration investigated the background on these people.
$15/hr…Entry level..hmm…if that is too low quit and find another job, nobody is stopping you.If u can’t find another job then quit bellyaching and do the job that you have. Simple supply and demand…There are lot of people who will be glad to have $15/hr + benefits; All you groaners have no idea how fierce the global competition is in every industry. No wonder all our jobs are being outsourced…