While Hollywood actors and writers continue striking to protect their livelihoods from studios hoping to replace them with AI, UNITE HERE’s goal in picketing local hotels is about one thing alone: gaining power.
One of the hotel worker union’s demands is a loyalty oath, prominently featured in a 55-page demand manifesto, that would require 44 Los Angeles hotels, represented by the Coordinated Bargaining Group, to publicly support a ballot measure mandating them to house the homeless alongside paying guests. Unfortunately, this plan does nothing to improve the working conditions of housekeepers and might even make their jobs less safe.
The union wants these hotels to impose a 7% tax on each guest room, on top of the already high local hotel taxes of up to 16% paid by Los Angeles tourists. The revenue from this tax would go into a trust fund managed by the union, estimated to reach $150 million annually, five times the current annual revenue of the local union. The fund would have significant discretionary power to allocate the money for “housing” or other purposes as it sees fit. Hotel negotiators suspect that the union aims to use these new revenue streams to expand its membership, and they accuse the union of striking under false pretenses.
In a blow to the environment, they are also pushing to prevent hotel guests from having the option to pass on having their rooms cleaned daily. West Hollywood has earned its sterling reputation as a municipality leading the charge against climate change and conservation — so why do our progressive city leaders have nothing to say about this? Would Mayor Sepi Shyne, Mayor Pro Tem John Erickson and Councilmember Chelsea Byers object to this brazen waste of resources if UNITE HERE hadn’t been so instrumental in getting them elected?
UNITE HERE’s aggressive stance is enabled by this pro-union environment, with Los Angeles City Councilman Hugo Soto-Martinez, a former paid organizer for the union, leading the legislative agenda. He even supported a wage ordinance favorable to the union’s bargaining efforts. This cozy relationship with city officials raises ethical concerns, as a city reliant on tourism should consider the implications of such actions on its economy.
Ultimately, it is the tourists who suffer the most. They have no vested interest in the labor dispute, yet they may end up shouldering the burden through a potential 7% room tax increase and having homeless guests placed next door. While the union leaders may remain indifferent, the city’s leadership should take heed of the impact on its tourism-dependent economy.
In our never ending quest for the most progressive and least offensive label we can give to the homeless, we can now move on from “unhoused neighbor” to “VIP Guest” since their hotel rooms will be comped.
These hardworking union workers deserve EVERY concession they can get out of their corporate oligarchs.
LOL. Why are Cubans desperate to leave?
Did the Bonaventure agree to those items when they settled early?
the terms of bonaventure arrangement have not been make public.
During election season we hear that police/firefighters/teachers/etc. are supporting one candidate (or issue) over the other, just know it is NOT the employees who have agreed – it is the unions speaking only in their own best interest! Those unions are in support of whichever candidate is going to give them, the unions, more power.
I worked in both law enforcement and public education and I learned that unions exist to keep bad employees in their jobs, … and to accrue power for themselves, the union, at the expense of the employer and us, the public/consumers.
I hate unions!
Los Angeles will vote in March on requiring hotel owners to give empty rooms to homeless persons. Imagine going to LA w/family on vacation then going to your hotel. At 8 pm a homeless mentally ill person is put in the room next door. You have no recourse. Welcome to #California.
Hotel maids are worth about $15.00 per hour. Paying them any more than that is extortion.
CA min wage is higher than that. And LA City and LA County have higher min wages than the state.
No easy solution here, but if we had no minimum wage, hotel workers would be paid the fair going rate for supply and demand of workers, hopefully paid as little as possible for unskilled labor, but enough to get them to show up regularly for work. Instead, we have a Mafia type thug system in place, who has bought off our City Council. Although I strongly believe in the rights of unions to exist, I also strongly believe the employers should have the right to fire any troublemaking employees they want. Making a bed is not rocket science. Weho maids… Read more »
This union is out of control. People better wake up and understand that it’s about POWER and they already have too much of it.
Correct, how many more raises can they get? “Oh we got a raise but now we work more.” Yes, because the hotel laid off one person from each shift so they can pay the rest of you idiots. Dear idiots, communism will leave you poor and working without a choice or say in the matter. You know, like a slave.
Unions are really a cancer on this country.
There are endless labor laws today…..so they only act like the mafia ….ensuring the worst employees can’t be fired.
They crush employee morale and ensure the business does everything possible to reduce headcount. All while extorting money from the employees.
And then support largely one party, which is made up of people who are incredibly easy to bribe, because their philosophy is inherently corrupt. Same as the mafia did in New York. Michael Franzese said it best when talking about the Democratic party.
truth
100% true. Unions are awful.