Thousands of Los Angeles-area hotel workers strike

Thousands of hotel employees in the Los Angeles area walked off from their positions Sunday to strike in an effort to demand higher wages and better benefits packages. 

In a news release, Unite Here Local 11, the union representing the hotel workers, said that a majority (96 percent) of members voted earlier this month in favor to authorize the strike. The union said they plan to create a hospitality workforce housing fund in addition to demanding for better wages, health care benefits, pension and safer workloads.

“Our members were devastated first by the pandemic, and now by the greed of their bosses,” Unite Here Local 11 president Kurt Petersen said in a statement. “The industry got bailouts while we got cuts. Now, the hotel negotiators decided to take a four-day holiday instead of negotiating. Shameful.”

The union has been negotiating with local hotels for a new contract since April, asking for their hourly wages to be increased by $5, followed by annual $3 bumps over the proposed three-year contract, according to The New York Times. 

Representatives for the hotels said the union has not been bargaining in good faith, with Keith Grossman, a spokesperson for the bargaining group of more than 40 Los Angeles and Orange County hotels, telling the Times that “the hotels want to continue to provide strong wages, affordable quality family health care and a pension.” 

Grossman also said the hotels offered to increase the pay for housekeepers who work in  Beverly Hills and downtown Los Angeles area hotels from $25 per hour to $31 per hour by January 2027, the Times reported. 

Westin Bonaventure, the biggest hotel in the Los Angeles area, announced it came to an agreement with its workforce a day before their contracts expired.

Hotel workers join a list of other workers in different industries who have either threatened to strike or walked off their job in the past months, pushing for better pay and working conditions. 

“For 14 years I saw how my mother worked as a housekeeper and fought hard to raise me,” Jennifer Flores, a front desk supervisor at the InterContinental Los Angeles Downtown, said in a statement. “I am striking because it is my turn to fight for a better future for me and my son.”