Union, hotel not quite on same page

Michael J. Mishak

Saturday, May 26, 2007 | 7:09 a.m.

Disagreement over wages and union-organizing rights threaten to push contract talks between MGM Mirage and Culinary Union workers beyond next week's deadline, company officials say.

In an e-mail to company executives, Cynthia Kiser Murphey , senior vice president of human resources for MGM Mirage, said the company has made "substantial progress" in its contract negotiations with the Culinary but still faces some significant hurdles involving money and the rights of workers to organize at nongaming portions of CityCenter, its massive mid-Strip project.

Culinary wants the organizing clause in its current contract to extend to "all the new MGM Mirage properties, joint ventures and auxiliary entities," including two boutique hotels and various restaurants at CityCenter. But Murphey said forcing such language on outside operators at CityCenter is "clearly unacceptable."

MGM Mirage says that it will honor so-called card check-neutrality at CityCenter's 4,000-room centerpiece hotel, allowing the union to openly organize workers, but that the union would need to negotiate separate agreements for other employers on the site.

About 6,000 of 12,000 new jobs in the development will be covered under the Culinary contract, Murphey said.

In a win for Culinary, MGM Mirage has agreed to maintain the union's current medical and pension benefits.

Current five-year contracts, affecting about 50,000 hotel and restaurant service employees, expire June 1. About 21,000 of those workers are employed by MGM Mirage. Because of consolidation in the gaming industry, this year's talks represent the largest union negotiations ever in Las Vegas.

Historically, contract talks have failed to meet the traditional May deadline. Five years ago citywide negotiations went until July.

"There's an enormous laundry list of (unresolved) items," said D. Taylor, secretary-treasurer of the Culinary Union. "We haven't gotten much done there." He said the union has made more progress with Harrah's Entertainment, but declined to offer details. Both sides are to meet on Thursday, the contract deadline.

MGM Mirage wants a wage formula based on the one Culinary and casino mogul Steve Wynn engineered when Wynn Las Vegas opened in 2005. That formula, part of a 10-year contract, links pay raises to the Western Consumer Price Index.

In the past, Murphey noted, representatives from the union and company simply negotiated fixed salary increases that would be spread out over the contract's duration.

Taylor declined to comment on the proposed wage formula because it has not been officially presented at the bargaining table. He said the union will submit its own economic proposal Wednesday when both sides sit down for more talks.