Culinary Union accepts contract hiking wages at Santa Fe

David Strow

Tuesday, July 25, 2000 | 10:37 a.m.

Possibly ending three years of contentious negotiations, the Culinary Union said it signed a contract at the Santa Fe hotel-casino, just as the property prepares to transition from the Lowden family to Station Casinos Inc.

Meanwhile, a long-running campaign by the Culinary to organize at the Rio took an unexpectedly nasty turn for the worse, as Culinary officials and the National Labor Relations Board accused the Rio and owner Harrah's Entertainment Inc. of a systematic campaign against organizers at the property, particularly among immigrant workers.

The end of negotiations at the Santa Fe, union officials claim, came on July 14, when four local unions -- Culinary, Teamsters, Bartenders and Operating Engineers -- accepted a contract first proposed by Santa Fe Gaming in January. This three-year contract, said Culinary organizer Kara Kelly, became effective "immediate upon acceptance."

"By accepting this proposal, what we've done is accepted a significant wage increase and allowed the company to continue with the benefits the workers already had," Kelly said.

Station deferred comment on the matter to Santa Fe Gaming officials, who could not be reached for comment.

The new contract, Kelly said, will raise wages for 750 Santa Fe workers in 30 job classifications -- though she said these hikes still will not put the workers in the wage range enjoyed on the Strip. Wage increases, the union said, range between 15 percent and 25 percent.

But the largest concession of all may be the lack of a clause that forces a new buyer to keep the union employees at the property -- language Kelly said the union could not negotiate into the contract.

Without this language, Kelly said, Station is free to press forward with plans to make all Santa Fe workers reapply for their jobs. The union will lose the right to represent the workers if more than half of the organized workers lose their jobs or are transferred to other Station properties.

This is a scenario the union already fears, as rumors persist that Station plans to reassign Santa Fe workers to other properties in order to go below the 50 percent threshold. These plans, Kelly said, were relayed by a Station attorney to Culinary representatives.

"If you had a plan to scatter the bargaining unit instead of giving people an opportunity to stay where they've been working ... that seems to me that's union busting," Kelly said.

Station denies any such message has been delivered to the Culinary.

"No one in this company ... has had any contact with the Culinary Union leadership," said Station spokesman Jack Taylor.

While the union declared an apparent end to the Santa Fe negotiations, the NLRB and the Culinary have hit the Rio with a 20-page complaint alleging widespread retaliation against workers attempting to organize at the property. The complaint alleges 44 Rio executives committed 143 illegal labor acts against Rio employees, almost all of them against immigrant workers. Two employees were fired, the complaint said, and several were threatened with physical violence.

"They've clearly had a systematic campaign to go against the most vulnerable group of workers," said D. Taylor, staff director at the Culinary. "It's a horrible reflection on the entire industry. We've never had a company do this before, particularly to this group of workers.

"I felt most responsible employers left this kind of thing behind in the 19th century."

A hearing on the complaint was scheduled for Oct. 23 in Las Vegas.

Rio President Jay Sevigny, however, said all of the managers named in the complaint have denied the charges.

"We've told our employees our opinion, that we don't believe a (union) relationship is in the best interest of our team," Sevigny said. "If our employees want to be represented, there are many casinos they could chose to work at to join that kind of environment."

Sevigny also denied any effort to target migrant workers.

"That's an absolutely false accusation," Sevigny said. "We enjoy a wonderful relationship with our employees, we respect all of our employees, and that's a very, very unfortunate attempt to misuse statistics."

In an effort to raise the political pressure on the Rio, Taylor said California Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante will hold hearings with the involved workers today at 5:30 p.m. at the Clark County Commission Chambers. Other political figures may also participate, Taylor said, but they have yet to confirm.