Editorial: Negotiate without strike talk

Wednesday, May 8, 2002 | 8:36 a.m.

Tensions are mounting between the Culinary Union and 36 casino properties downtown and on the Strip. The word no one wants to hear -- strike -- is increasingly being heard as contract talks continue with no agreement in sight. There isn't much time -- the current five-year contract expires June 1.

But there is enough time yet for both sides to remember the strike years of 1967, 1970, 1976, and 1984. There is time to remember the Frontier strike of 1991-1998. Does anyone want 2002 listed in that grouping? There is time to reflect on the violence and overall tension associated with the strikes of those years and on the bad publicity the city received around the world. Las Vegas is showing signs of recovering from Sept. 11 but a strike could curtail that recovery.

For the good of the whole Southern Nevada region, the union and hotel properties should resolve to make the ongoing negotiations more productive. Surely there is room for compromise on both sides. The union is organizing a May 16 vote among its nearly 50,000 members to authorize a strike. Casino managers are discussing the importation of replacement workers and bulking up their security. As a first order of business, this Cold War style posturing should be toned down.

At a time of skyrocketing medical costs and a national trend for workers to pay a portion of their health insurance, the union is demanding that 100 percent of their members' premiums be covered. Perhaps the union could budge on this. The hotels, meanwhile, could satisfy a major union issue by lessening the workloads of the housekeeping staffs, which increased after the layoffs following Sept. 11. Another point that should be appropriate for compromise is the length of the contract. The union wants two years, the hotels want four or five.

Everyone got a taste after Sept. 11 of what happens when tourism drops off. That was unavoidable. We'd like to think that on both sides of the negotiating table there are responsible people who realize that a strike is totally avoidable.

AT ISSUE:

The Culinary Union and 36 hotel properties downtown and on the Strip are negotiating a new contract amid heated talk of a strike.

OUR TAKE:

For the good of Southern Nevada, both sides should cool the rhetoric and negotiate in the spirit of compromise.