Hotel workers union rallies in Waikiki heading into talks

Organized labor took a beating on Wednesday in Washington, D.C., but you wouldn’t have known that by the show of force exhibited by the 1,500 Unite Here Local 5 hotel workers who kicked off bargaining talks with a rally Wednesday in Waikiki.

Contracts at 20 hotels expire this year for more than 10,000 workers who belong to Local 5. The union is slated to begin bargaining talks today with Marriott International. The company, which operates eight Local 5 hotels, became the state’s largest hotel employer after its 2016 purchase of Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc.

The event, which began at 4:30 p.m. on Kalakaua Avenue and drew Gov. David Ige and workers from Oahu and Kauai, was the largest Local 5 union action since the Kaiser workers strike in 2015.

“I just want you to know that I share your dream that one job should be enough,” Ige told the union, which recently endorsed him for a second term. “I stand with you to really create the kind of Hawaii that we would like to see for our children and our children’s children.”

The mood was festive though the event and similar Unite Here actions simultaneously taking place in nine other cities coincided with a Supreme Court ruling that government workers can’t be forced to contribute to labor unions that represent them in collective bargaining.

“This is the most important year. We are under attack by the corporations and the political leaders that they control,” said Eric Gill, Local 5 secretary-treasurer. “They’ve stacked the labor board. They’ve stacked the Supreme Court and today they issued a terrible anti-worker decision. It’s up to Local 5 to stand up and fight back not just for us, but for everybody.”

Ironically, market forces are another challenge that the union may face as its contracts begin expiring on Saturday. On one hand, 2017 was the seventh consecutive year of growth for the hotel industry, which saw its revenue rise more than 8 percent to $4.2 billion, according to data from Tennessee-based STR Inc.

But some uncertainty has come into the market since the Kauai floods at the end of April and the volcanic activity that began on Hawaii island May 3. Hoteliers have reported that May and June were mostly unchanged because visitors couldn’t cancel without penalties; however, some have noted booking drops from July onward.

Angela Prigge, a Sheraton Kauai worker who flew in for the Waikiki event, said it’s clear that the property where she works “is still busy and still making money” and workers deserve to share in the success.

Prigge said she and other Local 5 workers want to see Hawaii hotel employers use technology to innovate rather than cut jobs, to pay living wages and to protect workers from sexual harassment They also support the union’s idea to create the state’s first housing trust fund under the federal Taft-Hartley Act that governs labor management relations and was amended by Congress to include collectively bargained housing benefits.

If the housing trust fund passes, Gill said details still would need to be worked out. However, the union envisions using the fund to help members buy down mortgages and to pool resources to allow the state and the union’s new partner, the nonprofit Neighborhood Assistance Cooperation of America, to develop workforce housing projects.

Because Marriott is now Hawaii’s largest hotel employer, it will be the first hotel company to vet the housing fund, Gill said. It also will be the hotel company that will set the standard for all other contracts this bargaining cycle, he said.

Marriott did not address bargaining specifics on Wednesday, but stated that it has had “a long and productive relationship with Local 5” and looks forward “to working with the members of the bargaining team to reach a fair agreement.”

“Marriott is a company that values the contributions of all of our associates, and also respects their right to voice their opinions,” the company said.

Pat Ongjoco has worked for 34 years at Sheraton Waikiki, which was part of the Starwood family. He said workers anxiously await negotiations with their new employer Marriott.

“We just had a merger and we are concerned about job security,” said Ongjoco, who marched with his two sons — 8-year-old Milo Cynn- Ongjoco and 5-year-old Nico Cynn-Ongjoco. “More visitors are coming, but we’re seeing jobs and hours lost to automation, subcontracting and job combining. Workers are taking on more responsibility, but they aren’t getting more pay.”