Letter: Adelson should make strong bid for Sands workers

Sunday, Jan. 24, 1999 | 11:04 a.m.

I was employed at the Sands hotel-casino for more than 21 years. I was the senior bartender when the Sands closed on June 30, 1996.

When Adelson took over the Sands on April 27, 1989, the employees were promised a great future. His first president, Henri Lewin, had a meeting with the employees.

At that time the Mirage hotel-casino was under construction. Lewin told us we would never have to think of the Sands as being across the street from the Mirage. The Mirage would be known, in Las Vegas, as being across the street from the Sands. He unveiled a model of what the Sands was going to look like when it was remodeled in the future.

More than seven years went by and Adelson brought in several other presidents, chief operating officers, chief executive officers and managing teams. We were always told that the hotel was going to be rebuilt and the employees were promised that they were going to have a great future.

Then on May 16, 1996, we were told the Sands was closing and we had six weeks to get out.

Now Adelson is getting ready to open up his new hotel-casino. The only thing that he did for his employees is send them a letter about one month after he started taking applications giving them four days, in the month of December, to fill out an application.

Is this how Mr. Adelson would want his father to be treated?

Is this how Mr. Adelson will continue to treat his employees?

If Mr. Adelson was a "mensch" he would let his former employees come home.

Terry Greenwald