BOSTON, MA—Workers who cook, clean, and serve at the Harvard Club of Boston will picket tonight at the prestigious Club’s Commonwealth Ave location. The Harvard Club has unilaterally changed employees’ health benefit.
“Harvard Club is trying to force me to accept worse health care,” said 10-year employee Reina Serrano. “I’m pregnant with my first child and I’m terribly worried about what will happen to us if Harvard Club gets what they want.”
“Over the years we’ve learned that the Harvard community is thoughtful and compassionate,” said Brian Lang, President of UNITE HERE Local 26, which represents the workers at Harvard Club and at Harvard University.
“We are certain Harvard alumni and future Club members will not accept this mistreatment of the Club’s most valued asset, their employees.”
Employees began negotiating with the Club in June.
What: Employees of private club for Harvard and Ivy League alumni to picket
When: Thursday, October 15, 4:30 to 6:00 pm
Where: Harvard Club of Boston Back Bay, 374 Commonwealth Ave (at Mass Ave)
Who: 100 + Service workers of Harvard club and supporters
Visuals: Workers in server/waitress uniforms chanting, marching, and holding crimson Harvard-themed picket signs
For Immediate Release: October 15, 2015
Contact: Tiffany Ten Eyck, [email protected]
Religious & civic leaders: “End intimidation & surveillance at Wyndham Boston hotel”
Workers at the Wyndham hotel located across the street from Massachusetts General Hospital have been public with demands for stronger protection while cleaning rooms used by hospital patients.
The hotel settled with the National Labor Relations Board in December over worker complaints they’d faced surveillance and were offered money and benefits to stop organizing.
Rabbi Barbara Penzner of the Temple Hillel B’nai Torah synagogue, Father Philip C. Jacobs, and a representative of Boston City Councilor Ayanna Pressley returned to the Boston Wyndham hotel Thursday to speak with management about these concerns.
The hotel also faces proposed fines of $12,000 from OSHA for alleged violations related to worker safety.
The hotel is owned by Felcor, a Houston, Texas-based real estate investment trust.
Bay State Banner: Grant provides training funds for hotels, construction
A recent $3 million grant from the federal government will allow Boston to double the amount of women and people of color it helps train for jobs in the construction and hospitality industries, to about 400 over the next five years.
Harvard Club Employees Protest Proposed Health Plan Changes
Members of on-campus activist organization Student Labor Action Movement joined UNITE HERE Local 26 members to rally outside the Harvard Club of Boston on Thursday evening in protest of proposed changes to employee health care plans, which they say would raise out-of-pocket costs for employees. Local 26 serves Boston’s hotel and food service workers and represents Harvard Club staff.
Harvard Hilton hotel workers win union contract
Employees of the Harvard-owned DoubleTree by Hilton hotel in Boston joined Local 26 and ratified a first union contract in October. Workers first sought changes from hotel management and Harvard University, which owns the hotel, in 2013. The contract will bring up the workers up to the same standard as all unionized hotel workers in Boston and Cambridge, including wages of more than $19 an hour and affordable health care. Harvard students were heavily involved in picket lines and a boycott during the 2-year campaign.
Welcome to Local 26!
Harvard Club Staff Hold Picket Today
BOSTON, MA—Workers who cook, clean, and serve at the Harvard Club of Boston will picket tonight at the prestigious Club’s Commonwealth Ave location. The Harvard Club has unilaterally changed employees’ health benefit.
“Harvard Club is trying to force me to accept worse health care,” said 10-year employee Reina Serrano. “I’m pregnant with my first child and I’m terribly worried about what will happen to us if Harvard Club gets what they want.”
“Over the years we’ve learned that the Harvard community is thoughtful and compassionate,” said Brian Lang, President of UNITE HERE Local 26, which represents the workers at Harvard Club and at Harvard University.
“We are certain Harvard alumni and future Club members will not accept this mistreatment of the Club’s most valued asset, their employees.”
Employees began negotiating with the Club in June.
What: Employees of private club for Harvard and Ivy League alumni to picket
When: Thursday, October 15, 4:30 to 6:00 pm
Where: Harvard Club of Boston Back Bay, 374 Commonwealth Ave (at Mass Ave)
Who: 100 + Service workers of Harvard club and supporters
Visuals: Workers in server/waitress uniforms chanting, marching, and holding crimson Harvard-themed picket signs
For Immediate Release: October 15, 2015
Contact: Tiffany Ten Eyck, [email protected]