As part of a nation-wide effort, the AFL-CIO has boldly announced its intent to turn Los Angeles into a "union town" by 2002. Its main target: hotels and allied sectors of the hospitality industry. Just last month, Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union ("HERE") held a rally in Santa Monica, California to announce that it is targeting Los Angeles hotels for union organizing. More than half of the upscale hotel rooms in downtown Los Angeles are union. Now, HERE says it will target all Westside hotels, which are still primarily "non-union."

A similar effort is under way in the San Diego area where HERE recently obtained an enormous victory . HERE convinced the San Diego Convention Center Corporation to require neutrality or cardcheck agreements with the union for hotel developers with properties close to the Convention Center.

The Modern Union. 

Unlike traditional union organizing techniques which are visible and predictable, the "modern union," like HERE, engages in a well-financed campaign to build alliances with local government leaders, community groups, financing sources and politicians to leverage employers into accepting neutrality agreements or neutrality cardchecks in their places of business. The neutrality agreement or cardcheck requires employers to recognize a union if a simple majority of employees sign pledge cards. With this strategy, HERE avoids the protracted National Labor Relations Board ("NLRB") election process. Unions are far less successful in NLRB elections because they give an employer the time to organize a campaign to persuade its workers that they are better off without a union - to debunk the propaganda and work against the emotional appeals.

Attacks on Allied Hospitality Sectors. 

A focused organizing effort similar to that in Southern California hotels is under way in other sectors of the hospitality industry. For example, the Service Employees International Union ("SEIU"), which represents healthcare and other service workers, has announced a major organizing effort against extended-stay facilities, long-term care facilities and acute-care facilities throughout Southern California. In the past two years, 1,200 nurses in Southern California voted to join unions at three local private sector facilities: Good Samaritan Hospital, St. Vincent Medical Center and Henry Mayo Center. In addition, several thousand other healthcare workers, such as technicians and assistants, have joined unions.

In this sector, SEIU hopes to control votes through the same kind of pressure tactics employed by HERE, which are designed to generate "outside pressure" on employers - pressure from outside the organization, such as from government or regulators, customers, vendors and the like. At the same time, the unions targeting healthcare and other service workers avail themselves of certain political platforms likely to attract their constituencies, such as amnesty for undocumented workers and increases in the minimum wage laws. The union message to employees: "Support us because we control legislation that will improve your lives. Your employer does not support your interests and does not care!"

Seizing the Initiative and Preparing for the Battle. 

Employers who do not understand or recognize these new union organizing tactics may find themselves unable to effectively respond to a union campaign. To remain union-free, employers must develop union avoidance campaign strategies before they become a target. The modern union techniques will not provide the luxury of the time to organize an effective campaign as well as under the more traditional NLRB election. Proactive planning for these up-tempo techniques requires that employers:

1. Organize a well-trained team made up of management and outside professionals who understand union organizing strategies. Get this team on the job before the union shows up on your doorstep! Your team will look for organizing activity and tactics, internal and external, and develop an effective blueprint for action.

2.  Evaluate where you may be vulnerable to pressure from governmental, financial or political institutions to adopt neutrality agreements. If adoption of a neutrality agreement becomes a condition to critical government entitlements or financing, know that all neutrality agreements are not alike. You do not have to accept the standard form of neutrality or cardcheck agreement. Understand the neutrality process and develop an aggressive plan to negotiate the best possible agreement for your organization.

3. Win the hearts, minds and loyalty of your workforce before the union does! Many employers have been successful in keeping unions at bay by addressing the issues and solving the problems which unions traditionally use to gather votes before the union does. To this end, employers should conduct employee surveys of what is really on the workers' minds. Armed with this data, the employer can address and often solve the issues concerning the workforce, not only with money, but with an increased expenditure of management resources. Recently, one Southland hospitality employer implemented a program to provide its largely Hispanic workforce with basic information on immigration resources and laws. When the union promised assistance in this area in the course of a campaign, the employees were not persuaded.

4. Improve communications with your workforce. Show you care. Use internal and external resources. Sometimes all it takes to earn the loyalty and enthusiasm of your workforce is creating employee forums where management can explain the company's perspectives and employees can feel that they have input - a channel to ask questions and to express their ideas and concerns. Once these communication channels are in place, management has a much more effective way to respond to union propaganda.

5.  Develop your own alliances with local community leaders and institutions so when the union approaches them, they have empathy for your organization's needs, struggles and goals. You want to be able to develop these relationships before the union develops its partnerships.

This is a situation where an ounce of prevention is worth more than a pound of cure. Before the union focuses on your hotel, you want a quick diagnostic, an action plan on benefits, communications, strategies and training. If the union attacks, you have optimized your position for success. Whether the union attack comes or not, these preventative actions will have improved the loyalty and effectiveness of your work force.

For more information, contact Marta M. Fermandez at (310) 201-3534 or [email protected]