{"id":5247,"date":"2015-11-14T18:00:06","date_gmt":"2015-11-15T02:00:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/ross\/?p=5247"},"modified":"2015-11-15T00:49:19","modified_gmt":"2015-11-15T08:49:19","slug":"unite-here-local-8-and-the-aesa-2016-meeting-in-seattle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/ross\/2015\/11\/unite-here-local-8-and-the-aesa-2016-meeting-in-seattle\/","title":{"rendered":"UNITE HERE Local 8 and the AESA 2016 meeting in Seattle"},"content":{"rendered":"

The American Educational Studies Association<\/a> is meeting in San Antonio this week and the key issue of its business meeting on Saturday was how the organization should respond to the ongoing union boycott of the site of its 2016 meeting in Seattle.<\/p>\n

UNITE HERE \/ Hyatt Dispute and Settlement<\/strong><\/p>\n

Several years ago AESA entered into a contract with the Grand Hyatt in Seattle for its 2016 meeting.\u00a0The Hyatt hotel chain has for some time been an organizing\u00a0target of UNITE HERE, whose 265,000 members work primarily in the hospitality industry.<\/p>\n

In July 2013, an agreement was reached between Hyatt and UNITE HERE that ended a years long stalemate between the union and Hyatt as well as ending a national boycott of Hyatt-managed properties.<\/p>\n

Doug Patrick, senior VP of human resources for Hyatt said<\/a>\u00a0of the agreement:<\/p>\n

The national agreement between Hyatt and UNITE HERE is great news for our associates in markets where they haven\u2019t seen wage increases in four years \u2026 The associates will see the increases in wage and benefit enhancements they deserve.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

UNITE HERE\u00a0described the\u00a0key provision of the agreement as\u00a0establishing “a fair process,\u201d which includes a mechanism for employees at a number of Hyatt hotels<\/em> to vote on whether they wish to be represented by UNITE HERE.<\/p>\n

David Sherwyn, associate professor of law and academic director for The Center for Hospitality Research at Cornell University\u2019s School of Hotel Administration has described the deal as good for both sides. He told Hotel News Now <\/em>(HNN<\/em>),<\/p>\n

What it also shows is the belief of the inadequacy of the NLRB election. UNITE HERE was adamant that they didn\u2019t want to go to an NLRB election where you can do all kinds of mean and nasty stuff.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

HNN<\/a><\/em> reported that that\u00a0Hyatt didn\u2019t want to authorize card-check voting. According to Sherwyn, Hyatt wanted employees to go into booths to vote \u2018yes\u2019 or \u2018no\u2019 for elections. Card check involves a lot of peer pressure because voting is done in public, which Hyatt was against.<\/p>\n

\u201c(UNITE HERE is) giving them an election, and I\u2019m sure that they set some sort of ground rules about what they can and cannot be said and how the election is going to be done and so on,\u201d Sherwyn told HNN. \u201cWhat I\u2019m inferring is that Hyatt feels good because at the end of the day their employees are getting a vote.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rub for AESA’s 2016 meeting in Seattle is that the national agreement applies only to Hyatt-managed hotels and the the owner of the Grand Hyatt Seattle, Richard Hedreen, has refused to allow employees access to that fair process (e.g., card check).<\/p>\n

The response from UNITE HERE Local 8<\/a> in Seattle has been to ask customers to\u00a0boycott the Grand Hyatt Seattle<\/a> (and\u00a0Hyatt at Olive 8).<\/p>\n

UNITE HERE Local 8 says the\u00a0Boycott of Grand Hyatt Seattle is based on the following issues:<\/p>\n