Posts tagged food service workers
Letters: About Unionizing
October 26, 2026 // It is easy to get people excited by telling them you are going to get them a raise, but it is a bit more difficult to say where the money is going to come from. Most of the time, it comes from cutting other departments or ancillary staff. When cutting staff isn’t an option, the extras are cut instead. Housing, mortgage assistance, scholarships, daycare, the gym, etc.: Some of it will most certainly be cut to cover the increase in pay for nurses. The article lists the amount executives made as a means to cause Us vs Them mentality. I am uncertain what the author thinks executives make at most companies. I find it highly unlikely you could find a business with as many employees as Cottage where the executives aren’t making that amount or more. I am not saying I would say no to a raise, but to insinuate executives at union hospitals make less so they can pay their nurses more is simply not factually accurate.
20 healthcare strikes in 2026
September 28, 2026 // Union activity in healthcare continues in 2026, with 20 reported strikes since the beginning of the year. Some of these actions involve healthcare workers and leaders across hospitals and clinics in multiple states.
Logan Airport Food Fight: Workers Move Closer To Strike As World Cup Masses Descend
June 21, 2026 // UNITE HERE has been lining up strike-authorization votes at stadiums, hotels and airports in World Cup host cities and has warned that major labor disruptions are on the table during the tournament. In a June 2 press release, the union said workers in multiple host cities are prepared to withhold their labor during World Cup events if contracts are not settled, a tactic meant to sharpen employers’ incentives as international visitors arrive, according to UNITE HERE.
SoFi Stadium workers set to vote on strike ahead of World Cup
June 1, 2026 // The union has made demands that include, according to The Athletic: –A guarantee that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents will not be allowed on venue grounds during the World Cup, saying their presence could jeopardize employee safety. Government officials have said ICE agents would be on hand with security and not immigation enforcement their primary duty. –Restricted use of subcontractors. –No use of automation or artificial intelligence that could cause the loss of union jobs. –Release of information to the union that would detail things such as work hours or the distribution of tips and service charges.
Two Groups of Sofitel DC Lafayette Square Hotel Employees Officially Win Efforts to Free Themselves of Unwanted Unions
March 12, 2026 // Two separate groups of employees of Sofitel Washington DC Lafayette Square have prevailed in their battle to free themselves from the “representation” of Unite Here Local 25 and International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 99 union officials. Their victories were cemented after the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) officially certified the results of their votes to remove the unions. Sofitel Lafayette employee Mwandu Chibwe spearheaded the Unite Here “decertification” effort for the more than 60 food service workers, front of house workers, room attendants, and other hospitality workers. The engineers’ and painters’ decertification of IUOE Local 99 was led by Yuri Lishchenko. Both workers received free legal aid from the National Right to Work Foundation.
Rady Children’s Hospital challenges a vote to unionize by frontline workers
January 20, 2026 // Rady Children’s Hospital is challenging a vote to unionize by more than 1,500 frontline workers, including environmental services attendants, patient care assistants, patient access representatives, food service workers, medical interpreters, and medical assistants. The workers cited staffing shortages and working conditions they say affect patient care as the reasons behind the vote to unionize on Jan. 6.
UC Santa Barbara Service and Patient Care Workers Join Strike over Wages, Housing Inequality
November 19, 2025 // The union — American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299, which represents about 40,000 food service workers, custodians, hospital technicians, and patient care assistants across the UC system, including around 600 at UCSB — has been in contract negotiations with the university for 22 months. Members of the California Nurses Association who work at UC hospitals also went on strike in solidarity. The key issue: affordability. The union says average frontline workers, who make between $40,000–$60,000 a year, now earn 10 percent less in real wages than before the pandemic.
Op-ed: Can Zohran Make NYC a Union Town Again?
September 9, 2025 // The new mayor could host big online unionization trainings with the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee, as Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez have already done. If this led even a small fraction of Zohran’s 60,000-plus volunteers and over 6 million social media followers to start organizing their own workplaces—or to take a strategic job to unionize it—this could potentially generate thousands of new unionization campaigns. And were Mamdani to act upon our proposal to launch a broad Movement for an Affordable New York (MANY), then the pool of new potential workplace organizers would grow significantly.
All major Las Vegas Strip casinos are now unionized in historic labor victory
August 5, 2025 // For 25 years, her employer, the Venetian, had resisted organizing efforts as one of the last holdouts on the Strip, locked in a prolonged standoff with the Culinary Workers Union. But a recent change in ownership opened the Venetian’s doors to union representation just as the Strip’s newest casino, the Fontainebleau, was also inking its first labor contract. The historic deals finalized late last year mark a major turning point: For the first time in the Culinary Union’s 90-year history, all major casinos on the Strip are unionized. Backed by 60,000 members, most of them in Las Vegas, it is the largest labor union in Nevada. Experts say the Culinary Union’s success is a notable exception in a national landscape where union membership overall is declining.
House food service workers, Democrats stage boycott in fight to keep union jobs
July 24, 2025 // Congressional Labor Caucus co-chairs Reps. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.), Donald Norcross (D-N.J.) and Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) joined food service employees in front of the Capitol building after final votes Thursday to protest the new vendors’ delay in recognizing the Unite Here Local 23 bargaining unit’s existing agreement. Union members are asking lawmakers, staff and Capitol visitors to boycott six of the new venues: Starbucks, Pakistani food restaurant CHA Street Food, Jimmy John’s, Common Grounds, Java House and PX Tacos.