Union workers in Greenwich, Connecticut, and Providence, Rhode Island, ratified contracts with their hotel employers, marking an end to labor disputes in those cities, according to a release from hospitality union Unite Here.
The contracts — with Hyatt Regency Greenwich and Omni Providence Hotel — are the first to be reached in this year’s nationwide hospitality strikes, which have seen upwards of 10,000 workers walk off the job in multiple waves of strikes since early September.
Workers at the Greenwich hotel walked out in the first wave of strikes over Labor Day weekend. While Providence hotel workers voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike, they never walked out.
The newly negotiated contract includes wage increases and “more affordable” health care, according to the union, which did not disclose further details. George Cook, a banquet attendant in Providence, called it “the best contract we ever had” in a statement.
Labor disputes remain unresolved in other markets across the country. Approximately 4,000 union workers are currently on strike in Honolulu, San Francisco and San Diego. And the union says more strikes “could begin at any time” in the cities where they’ve been authorized: Baltimore; Boston; Kauai, Hawaii; Oakland, Sacramento, San Jose and San Mateo County, California; and Seattle.
Many of those markets with strikes authorized have already seen walkouts. Boston hotel workers, for instance, have held three waves of limited-duration strikes.
Those on strike elsewhere in the country have elected to stay off the job until their contract demands are met.
Some 40,000 hotel workers across the U.S. and Canada are negotiating work contracts this year, according to Unite Here. Workers are advocating for wages that better meet the rising cost of living and a reversal of COVID-era staffing cuts.
