Lobbying under way for workers

David Strow

Wednesday, Oct. 10, 2001 | 9:55 a.m.

MGM MIRAGE said Tuesday it plans to join the Culinary Union in a federal lobbying campaign intended to secure more benefits for laid-off Las Vegas casino workers.

The campaign is a broad-based effort involving both the casino industry and hotel industry designed to secure benefits for hospitality workers across the country. Participants in the campaign include the American Gaming Association and the American Hotel-Motel Association.

"Obviously our interests are directly related to our employees here," said MGM MIRAGE spokesman Alan Feldman. "But there is definitely the broader issue of hospitality workers nationwide who have been very severely impacted by all this.

"We're working with the (Culinary) union, in terms of their lobbying effort ... to talk to members of Congress and educate them on the impact this (tourism downturn) has had on our community and the state, and to seek their support in ways Congress can help displaced workers."

More than 13,000 casino workers were laid off by casinos throughout Las Vegas following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 and the subsequent drop in tourism to the city. MGM MIRAGE alone has laid off about 6,000, though it has been able to call back about 10 percent to 12 percent of those workers in recent days as business picks up.

The first focus of the campaign will be to seek an extension of unemployment benefits for laid-off casino workers. Currently, those benefits terminate after 26 weeks.

An extension of health-care benefits is almost certain to be part of the campaign as well.

"We're going to want some sort of safety net if this should continue," Feldman said.

Though the Culinary and MGM MIRAGE will be moving together jointly on this effort, the two sides were ultimately not able to reach an agreement on a plan proposed by Culinary Local 226 two weeks ago. The Culinary had proposed an across-the-board reduction in its members' work hours, property-by-property, in exchange for each casino agreeing to rehire a pre-set number of laid-off workers. Though other operators had expressed doubts about the proposal, MGM MIRAGE had appeared to be the warmest to the idea.

But in the end, the two sides were unable to come to an agreement, Feldman said.

"Had this (the business drop-off) been more gradual, this would have been fine," Feldman said. But waiting for the union to mobilize thousands of members for a vote "just took too much time," he said.

"The problem (with implementing the program after layoffs have occurred) is that it's done, and you have people whose lives have been disrupted. Right now we've stabilized the workforce based on the business levels we have. Our principal focus is now trying to build it back up to where we can make substantive progress in calling people back to work."

The company will, however, participate in replicating the Culinary Union's "Project Helping Hand," a response center for laid-off workers opened at the union's hall last week. "Project Helping Hand 2," backed by MGM MIRAGE, Park Place Entertainment Corp., Boyd Gaming Corp. and the Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce, will open at the Community College of Southern Nevada's Technology Center in Henderson today.

More than 4,000 workers have already used the Culinary's response center since it opened last week.