Friday, May 9, 2003 | 5:13 a.m.
THE CULINARY Union's interest in organizing some 10,000 employees at Station Casinos has not been a secret in gaming industry circles.
Union organizers quietly have been reaching out to workers at the company's 11 neighborhood casinos for months now.
But in recent days the 50,000-member union has begun to draw some battle lines in anticipation of a long and hard-fought grass-roots campaign to bring Station workers into its fold.
There is no doubt that the battle will be hard-fought because Station offers its employees an attractive compensation and benefits package that is comparable to and, in some cases, better than what the union offers.
Last week Culinary Secretary-Treasurer D. Taylor acknowledged that the union, which has never sought to organize so many employees in one swoop, isn't even close to going public with its grass-roots campaign. He candidly said the union hasn't even figured out how to launch a ground campaign against a company so big and so spread out in the community.
"It's like trying to organize an octopus," Taylor quipped.
Will the union organize one Station casino at a time? Or will it go after all 10 properties at the same time?
One thing the union does know how to do, however, is attack a company from the top in what's known as a corporate campaign. It has done this with the Venetian, where it has been trying to organize workers the past four years, and it is doing it now in its opening salvos against Station Casinos.
The idea is to put pressure on a company's officers and directors on Wall Street or with its shareholders or even with its lending institutions in the hope that management will cave and decide not to fight organizing efforts.
"If it's done well, it can be very effective," said attorney Gregory Kamer, who has represented management in several battles with the Culinary Union over the years. "It's an easier way to get recognized at a company."
For the moment, the union is taking the easy approach in its fight with Station Casinos.
This month the union began publicly criticizing the company's bid to extend its executive stock option plan for another decade. The matter comes up for a vote at a May 21 stockholders meeting.
Union researchers put together a seven-page report on the stock option plan that concluded the plan benefits the company's top executives -- primarily members of the Fertitta family, who have a controlling shareholder interest -- at the expense of the company's outside shareholders.
The report was fed to The Wall Street Journal, which ran a story on May 1 under the headline, "Executive Options Take Luster Off Casino's Shares." Courtney Alexander, the union's research director, also sent letters to Station board members urging them to oppose the stock option extension.
But if the union is looking for early signs of weakness among Station executives, it's not happening.
In The Wall Street Journal story, Glenn Christenson, the company's chief financial officer, defended the stock plan as being within industry norms, and he called the union's tactics a "transparent" attempt to get the attention of employees.
On Friday Lesley Pittman, vice president of corporate and government relations, took an even tougher fighting stance.
"We think it's pretty clear what union management is trying to do," she said. "They've made it no secret that we're one of their top targets here. They've had no success organizing our team members, and we think it's simply an effort to harass our company."
What does all of this mean?
Probably that we're witnessing the beginning of a labor fight the likes of which Las Vegas has never seen.
The union has never proven that it has the mettle to go after a company this size for as long as it takes.
But if it does, and if both sides remain entrenched, as in the case of the Venetian, then there's a good chance we'll be talking about this fight for years to come.
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