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Media Articles on Law Firm Tentative
Agreement in Hotel Talks Deal with 11 of S.F.’s San Francisco Chronicle By David Lazarus Hoping to avert a threatened hotel industry strike, operators of 11 of San Francisco’s largest hotels have reached an "agreement in principle" with workers, a union spokeswoman said last night. A final deal could be reached by Friday. Members of Local 2 of the Hotel and Restaurant Workers Union had voted last month to strike if negotiations remained deadlocked. Their five-year contract with 50 hotels and motels in San Francisco expired August 14. "Right now, the agreement is only verbal," said union spokeswoman Valerie Lapin. "We still have to put it down in writing." "Things could fall apart this week when we start crossing the T’s and dotting the I’s." The union represents about 8,000 room cleaners, dishwashers and restaurant workers. The tentative accord was reached at 2 a.m. Sunday when Mike Casey, president of the Local 2, finally came to terms with Stuart Korshak, the Los Angeles lawyer representing the hotels. Lapin said Korshak could not be reached for comment. Lapin said that both sides are pleased with the pending agreement and that Casey and Korshak will continue meeting over the next few days to produce a final pact. The last major San Francisco hotel strike was called in 1980 when workers walked picket lines at several establishments for a full month. That action cost the city more than $10 million in lost tourism revenue. In the latest dispute, union workers have demanded that their $12 hourly wage be increased to at least $13.50. They also are asking for improved health benefits. One hotel operator, who requested anonymity, told The Chronicle several weeks ago that San Francisco’s hotel workers already are the highest paid in the nation and insisted that companies cannot afford fatter paychecks. In the first half of this year, hotel occupancy was 76.4 percent, 1.2 percent more than a year before, according to Smith Travel Research, a tourism industry consulting firm. The current talks have been with 11 of the city’s so-called Class A hotels, including the St. Francis, the Fairmont, the Palace and the Hyatt Regency. There are 12 other Class A hotels, and Lapin said talks would begin with them as soon as a deal with the first group is reached. As with labor negotiations in the auto industry, an initial
pact with one group usually serves as a model for others. Lapin said
talks with most of the other hotels should proceed smoothly, although
"we anticipate possible problems with some of them." She declined to
identify which establishments may be problematic.
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