Union chief says casinos hiring back workers too slowly

Monday, Oct. 22, 2001 | 9:38 a.m.

Las Vegas casino resorts aren't hiring back laid-off workers as rapidly as tourists are returning, a local labor leader says.

D. Taylor, staff director of the Culinary Union, said the city's resort industry is slowly bringing some employees back to work, but occupancy rates have been rebounding at a better pace.

Taylor said even though room rates haven't been as high and revenue hasn't picked up as quickly as occupancy, there's a lot being asked of employees who have gotten their jobs back.

"There still are rooms to clean and tables to bus," said Taylor after a panel on the closing day of the 15th annual World Gaming Congress and Expo at the Sands Expo Center. "Some employees have been asked back to do a job, (sometimes) the jobs of three or four people."

Participants in Friday's panel on the state of unions said the ability of unions and companies to adjust to the changes thrust on them by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks will be a key issue in future labor relations.

Taylor said flexibility will be important to future union-management relationships, but panelist Mark Riccardi, an employment attorney, said the Culinary has become such a large machine that it can't react quickly in a crisis.

Both points were illustrated in late September and early October when the Culinary asked its membership to accept reduced work hours for two months to help get laid-off employees back to work. The proposal -- currently not permitted in the Culinary's contracts with hotel-casinos -- was favored by members by about a 2-to-1 margin.

But many in the minority felt the move upended a seniority system under which the union's newest members are the first to be laid off.

Once the proposal was approved, the union then had to approach individual properties about implementing it. By then, the first of about 4,000 of the estimated 13,000 resort industry employees who were laid off began returning to work.

Taylor said something else that will occur in the post-Sept. 11 era is that organized labor will get behind industry efforts for subsidies and relief related to the terrorist attacks.

"We know that there will be proposals for relief on Capitol Hill," Taylor said, "and we must lobby together on that."

Taylor said the Culinary would work toward passage of an economic stimulus package that would guarantee that laid-off workers would have their health-insurance premiums paid. He also said he would seek a boost in unemployment benefits, noting that "living off $200 a week is ludicrous."

He said Nevada's House members, Reps. Shelley Berkley and Jim Gibbons, have been supportive of the union's efforts.

Other issues ahead for unions:

* The organization of dealers by the Transportation Workers Union. Riccardi and panelist Shannon Bybee theorized that the TWU largely failed in its bid to unionize dealers earlier this year because dealers saw themselves as capable of representing themselves in negotiations with management. Bybee, director of UNLV's International Gaming Institute, said dealers view themselves as professionals and that unions most often represent the less powerful employees in labor negotiations.

* Organizing employees at the Venetian hotel-casino. The Venetian, the largest non-union property on the Strip, has received the Culinary's attention since the property opened in 1999. Taylor called organizing the Venetian "a long-term goal and not something confined to a year or two." Venetian officials said Friday the property has not unionized because it offers superior benefits for its employees.

* Organizing employees at Indian casinos. Taylor said federal regulations prohibit the unions from organizing those properties, but unions would seek legislative changes to allow it.

* The treatment and working conditions of housekeeping employees. Taylor said many of those employees are easily intimidated women or people who speak English as a second language. "There are all kinds of health and safety problems that need to be looked at," Taylor said.

* The "age-old problem of money," Taylor said. Las Vegas, he said, used to be an inexpensive place to live, but that has changed with a dramatic increase in the cost of living. "It's going to be challenging for both parties," Taylor said.