Mixed Results for Bay Area Labor Struggles in 2006

By Judith Scherr - Berkeley Daily Planet, January 5, 2007

While several local long-term labor disputes ended happily for workers in 2006—Berkeley Honda, Alta Bates/Summit and Claremont Resort & Spa employees signed contracts after protracted struggles—workers at the Shattuck Cinema, Doubletree Hotel, UC Berkeley and the Woodfin Suite Hotel will continue to fight for better pay, benefits and working conditions in 2007.

Shattuck Cinema In Negotiations

While the hospitality industry becomes increasingly unionized, a movie-theater union is rare. In June, however, workers at the Shattuck Cinema, one of 56 Landmark Theaters, voted overwhelmingly to establish a union. One other Landmark Theater —the one in Cambridge, Mass.—is unionized.

But neither has successfully negotiated labor contracts.

“It’s a slow and tedious process,” said Hargitt Gill, organizer with the Industrial Workers of the World, better known as the Wobblies.

Soon after the union was voted in, the company voluntarily raised wages. Eligibility for partially-employer-paid benefits continues to be an issue, as is the question of the theater becoming a union shop, where every worker must belong to the union.

If negotiations are not successful, “we will be increasing the pressure, asking for the community to help us put more pressure on Landmark,” Gill said.

Read the entire article.