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Culinary Workers Union Local 226 members make their voices heard outside the downtown casinos on Saturday.
Saturday, Oct. 13, 2012 | 10:32 p.m.
Sun archives
Downtown protest
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KSNV reports about Culinary Union workers protesting on Fremont Street. Oct. 13.
Beverly Hoffrichter’s voice is hoarse.
For eight hours Hoffrichter, a cocktail waitress at the D, was picketing outside the property with her fellow Culinary Union workers as part of a massive protest outside all nine downtown casinos Saturday. Hundreds came and went in shifts during the protest, but not Hoffrichter. She stayed.
Her scratchy voice was the result of hours chanting and shouting — a badge of honor in the larger fight for union workers to make their voices heard. The 3,500 Culinary Union members with jobs downtown were picketing to maintain health and retirement benefits in their contracts.
“We’re hoping to get our 15 cents,” Hoffrichter said referring to the increase sought for the workers’ health and pension funds.
The negotiations have been going on since the contracts expired in June. Culinary Union Local 226 president Geoconda Arguello-Kline said the union members all voted to hold the protest on Saturday, even though it happened to fall on “Rediscover Downtown" day, an event designed to highlight the attractions in downtown Las Vegas.
“Today is a busy day, and we want downtown to grow,” Arguello-Kline said. “But it’s the workers who make it grow.”
Sporting matching red shirts, about 100 union members were stationed outside each casino — El Cortez, 4 Queens, the D, Golden Nugget, Fremont, Golden Gate, Binions, Las Vegas Club and Main Street Station. Each group — waitresses, bartenders and other hotel workers — marched in an oval waving signs with slogans such as “No justice, no peace!” while chanting phrases such as “No contract, no peace!” Union spokeswoman Bethany Khan estimated that there had been a few thousand protestors throughout the day.
Workers from the Strip also showed up to offer their support. Michael Tirabossi, a room service waiter at Treasure Island, spent his off day protesting.
“I came to support my brothers and sisters,” Tirabossi said. “There’s a strength in numbers.”
The protests elicited several curious looks from tourists. Hoffrichter said a couple of people avoided the casinos because they supported the union. Shalina Tilman, who works at the Golden Nugget, experienced the opposite reaction from tourists. She said many complained about the noise and space the protestors took up on the walkway.
Arguello-Kline said it could have been avoided if the casinos signed the contract.
“We have a picket line,” Arguello-Kline said. “People know this is a labor dispute. If (casinos) want to have peace, they have to give workers health and pension benefits.”
Until then, workers like Hoffrichter are prepared to lose their voice to make it heard.
They're like little gnats that you swat away. The protests were a bit annoying, but didn't take away at all from a great day on Fremont street.
12% unemployment rate in NV. 140,000 unemployed or under-employed. And Culinary workers are out there money-grubbing. And they have the nerve to bad-mouth the successful? Who's being greedy now?
The Union is right. the "successful" people have exploited the 99% and for the past 30 years have gotten virtually all the money from the economy.
What we need are more protest and more telling the truth about how the 99% are being exploited.
Illegal immigration has nothing to do with it. Never mind the fact that these corporations need a constant supply of human workers to exploit, especially from families that have American children.
"money grubbing", says Jerry Fink...
"We're hoping to get our 15 cents," Hoffrichter said referring to the increase sought for the workers' health and pension funds."
Yeah, those greedy b@#tards!
Welcome Vice President Bidden! You will fit right in on Monday during your visit here to address the Culinary Union. Please stay away from Downtown though. We are trying to revive the area.
I have never worked for an employer who was unionized, but I DO support the unions 100%. Because of the unions, the American workforce enjoy the following benefits:
40 hour Workweek
Paid Vacations and Holidays
Minimum Wage
Healthcare Benefits
Decent paying jobs
Child Labor Laws
Five-Day Workweek
Retirement Plans
Workplace Safety
Representation with Management
Corporate GREED is at an all time high and if given the opportunity, they would eliminate all the benefits for the average worker.
For years, corporations in many lines of business have been hiring part-time workers so that they did not have to provide them with benefits! LIKE HEALTHCARE!!!
Corporations are trying to get the most, pay the least, reduce, and/or eliminate essential benefits. Why, so that the CEO and shareholders can make a little bit more.
While GREED is taking over in the country, our worldwide rankings are falling.
So, what I have to say is GO UNION!!!!
Keep up the fight!!!
Great Job!!!!!
Never Stop Fighting for what is Right, Just and Fair!!
ROMNEY/RYAN fight for the RICH ONLY
OBAMA/BIDEN fight for the rest of us
OBAMA/BIDEN and the Entire Democrat ticket 2012
Lets all fight for a better tomorrow!!!! We can do it. We just need to believe.
I think picketing in Spanish adds a nice made in the USA touch!
"I think picketing in Spanish adds a nice made in the USA touch!"
Best comment of the day! Thank you!
Since the Union does not bother to find out of these fine folks picketing with Spanish signs are legal or not, yet they take money from them to keep them employed, are they aiding and abetting?
Don't some of the Coyotes that bring them across the border do the same thing? We take you to America but you work and pay us for life?
Unions lost my support as soon as I saw the sign was in spanish.
This is still America...speak (write)in English or go home.
I generally support unions and their right to protest, but what i saw last night was disgusting. There was a street party going on with food trucks and wrestling that had nothing to do with the casino. Every time someone at the street party would come on stage to speak on microphone the union would sound a siren so you could barely hear the people on stage. It was extremely disrespectful and the union should be ashamed. This union definitely lost my support last night. Big black eye for you. Directing your protest at people who have nothing to do with your plight is wrong. It really showed your true colors. I would urge the union leaders to denounce this type of bullying.
Unions by nature are bullies...they bully their members for dues, they bully politicians to extort support and favor, they bully the public if they disagree.
Go to *ell unions, you are losing the battle for a very good reason.
Kepi, you nailed it. Greedy corporations and owners are what keep the unions in business. If not for thier greed, there would be no need for unions. Unions and their sympathizers should be picketing Station Casinos every day for those greedy thugs are prime reason for unions.
nice signs
That sign is NOT going to drum up support for the union workers. Bad move. Last I looked - Las Vegas is in the United States, not Mexico (even though at times it looks like it).
15 Cents! WOW! I only got 10 Cents thanks to the health care worker union I belong to! Guess I can't afford that Escalade I had my eye on!
Per LVSun coverage and AP, Nevada has the highest rate of illegals employed--upwards of 12% and rising. As soon as we enforce our laws and get after employers of illegals, our unemployment rate will drop like a rock. Otherwise, more illegals will move in from Arizona, Alabama, Georgia and everywhere else that they can get their State Politicians to act.
The 1% (the owners) need that extra 15 cents for more mansions and yachts!
Why are those sign printed in spanish? that alone ought tell ya something. We can't even have picket signs in ENGLISH ? If the workers can't speak or spell in english that makes the culinary union look really shady.
Do you honesly believe these people are over paid?
They shop in your stores, attend your schools, drive on the same roads breath the same air and are trying to make a living, how ever meager, just like the rest of us in the 47%. Why would you not grant them the 15 cents the same as you deserving what you earn? English Spanish they are Americans working toward the same dreams we all have. You all sound like you have to pay it out of your own pocket.....quit gambling down town if you think they are so terrible. (not citizens? proove it)
I'm going to the D this weekend!
Why pay dues when that hard earned money can go back in your pocket.
We union members will keep fighting these greedy,
heartless republicans until the end of time.
NO PROBLEM!
LIVE BETTER/WORK UNION!!!
These union people are like Sheep....
I hope Vegas kicks theunion out an hires people that want to work..
I work in a casino and they want go extra mile for customer..
it has runied service in this town
lets get rid of the union ASAP!
LOSERS
real1....
Not in your lifetime.
Anti-union republicans destroyed our middle class.
UNIONS ARE MAKING A COMEBACK!!!
Average Americans who are against unions are
brain-washed and brain-dead.
Stop being stupid, if you can.
Protesting on a day set aside to promote tourism in the area... Nothing like biting the hand that feeds you. Hope the union realizes how much locals appreciate their contribution to the revitalization of downtown (yes, read that last with sarcasm intact).
sage.....
We locals support union workers.
These are American workers, for Christ sake.
The greedy CEO'S are rich enough.
Stop being a slave to your republican
slave-masters.
Why is it when Wynn takes all the money he can grab it's great business sense...but when it's an average American, making $12 an hour, riding the bus to work both ways, and not even getting insurance, it's greed, laziness, and communist? Unless you are in a Union, you could NEVER EVER stand up for your own rights, safety. Child Labor Laws, weekends, health insurance, paid vacation, no more COMPANY STORE....ALL thanks to Unions. Can you imagine the TRUMP Company Store??? lol
Since when did the majority (those not having $100,000 to $250,000+ in the bank) choose the upper crust over their own family and neighbors? You vote against your own good because of myths you hear on Fox News & AM Hate Radio. No body wants to take your guns, no gays want to marry you. The UN is not taking over. Obama is not a Socialist Muslim w/a freaky Christian Pastor who dictates his every Marxist thought. THINK PEOPLE!!!
"English Spanish they are Americans working toward the same dreams we all have." (NewBee)
I think that's probably a very incorrect assumption ... part of the problem is that many are NOT Americans at all :(
Wow, I'm so disappointed in the mean comments I read here. I work at one of the downtown casinos, and participated in the protest. To those who think the signs were only in Spanish, you are wrong. They were double sided, with one side in Spanish and one in English. In a state with a large Spanish-speaking population, I don't see that as a problem.Nobody meant that as an insult. Most people I work with in my department are English-speaking Americans. I am from Europe,so neither English or Spanish are my native languages. I have passed a very thorough verification of my legal status when I got hired and throughout my employment, so to suggest that most people in the protest or working in casinos are illegals, is ludicrous, mean and unfounded.Also, I can tell you that what we are mostly concerned about is our health insurance. If it was up to the owner of the casino where I work at, we wouldn't have health insurance, we'd be making $5/hour,we wouldn't have full-time shifts or job security. You'd think the working-class citizens would be more empathetic towards our situation, but I guess mean-spirited people need an outlet to. It saddens me.