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Health Care Remains Key Casino Labor Issue

LAS VEGAS -- The expense of the Culinary's health care plan dominated talks with Strip operators two months ago as this year's contract negotiation season got under way.

Now, with all union Strip properties settled and all but one property settled downtown, the cost of the union's health care plan remains central, the key issue preventing the Golden Gate from negotiating a new deal with its 175 striking maids, food-service workers and bartenders.

Golden Gate owner Mark Brandenburg met union officials and about 15 members of his property's union negotiation committee Friday afternoon at Culinary headquarters in a meeting both parties hoped could lead to a settlement and an end to the four-day-old strike.

Brandenburg has said he can not afford the terms of the new five-year contracts that require as much as $2.00 in additional hourly payments to fund workers' union health care plans.

He even says he can't afford the deal negotiated by his strapped downtown neighbor, Binion's Horseshoe, that allows each year's increased payments to be delayed for 11 months.

Brandenburg's offered to put his workers on his company's lower-cost health plan, but the Golden Gate's union workers say they'd rather see the property be sold or close than accept the inferior coverage Golden Gate nonunion workers get.

The unions' Strip and downtown workers with new five-year contracts won't see much of an estimated $703 million in additional citywide contract contributions required by the new deals.

Culinary Secretary-Treasurer D. Taylor estimated that between $1.70 and $2.00 of the new moneys payable by the deals' fifth years would need to go to the health care plans, leaving as little as $1.23 for Strip workers' wage and pension hikes.

Downtown workers would fare even worse, getting as little as 20 cents in new wage and pension increases.

Taylor said before Friday's negotiation session with Brandenburg that the union's health plan is a leader in working to keep costs under control.

Acknowledging that national rise in health care costs can't be tackled in Las Vegas alone, Taylor said the union will do everything it can to keep costs low and benefits wide-ranging.

"We've been at the forefront of innovative ways to hold the line on costs," Taylor said. "It's indisputable that health care in this valley's in crisis, but we're committed to keeping costs down."

Brandenburg didn't return a Friday phone message.

Downtown casino lawyer Gregg Kamer, who negotiated for Binion's Horseshoe, Four Queens, El Cortez, Western, Las Vegas Club and the Plaza, said health care costs will continue to dominate future casino labor talks.

"Until we have some type of single-payer health care system, and as long as health care costs rise faster than the cost of living, this will be a big issue," Kamer said.

Kamer's clients had originally asked the unions to allow the downtown properties to put union workers on the properties' health plans rather than the union plan, but those proposals were eventually dropped.

Health care's central role in the Culinary contract negotiations isn't surprising, said Richard Hurd, professor of labor studies at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.

"The most common subject of dispute in negotiations today is health care, because it's been rising faster than the cost of living," Hurd said.

Most issues in labor negotiations cost one side but benefit the other, he explained. For example, if management pays workers $1 extra per hour, the workers get the extra buck for every hour worked.

It's even possible for each side to benefit, Hurd said, if management receives some productivity increase in exchange for a pay hike, allowing a win-win result.

But health care costs are typically worse than a zero-sum game in contract talks, Hurd said.

"The costs are going up, so one side has to absorb them," he said. "If the employer absorbs the cost and the employees keep the same quality coverage, management's paying more just to keep the workers at the status quo. The additional spending goes not to the workers, but to cover the increased cost of health care."

Culinary Political Director Glen Arnodo said Friday that most union and many nonunion health plans used to be similar to the Culinary's health plan, offering comprehensive coverage with no out-of-paycheck cost to workers.

The Culinary's plan has become the exception rather than the rule, he said.

"Virtually no nonunion workers in Las Vegas get health care without a paycheck deduction," Arnodo said. "And the trend is unfortunately the same for union workers."

But the Culinary's membership is different from that of many other unions, Arnodo explained. Many of the union's members are single parents; others have spouses with no company-provided health care plan.

That's why Culinary members overwhelmingly approved the new five-year contracts despite the fact that few of the additional dollars will go toward pay raises.

"The workers are a lot more sophisticated than people give them credit for," Arnodo said. "They understand that keeping their health plan has real value."

Golden Gate union negotiating committee members waiting for the Friday afternoon bargaining session with Brandenburg said the union's plan is far superior to the Golden Gate's nonunion plan.

Golden Gate cook Earnest Harden has five kids, all covered by the Culinary plan.

"It's the best plan I've ever seen," Harden said. "Our Culinary health care is vital. My wife works for the school board, and she couldn't even afford to put me on their plan, much less the kids.

Cocktail server Adriana Mora, a 12-year Golden Gate worker, said nonunion workers at the tiny Fremont Street property say their plan is too expensive.

"They say it's pretty shoddy," Mora said. "My daughter is deaf in one ear, and my son has (attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder). I can't take a chance on inferior coverage."

Cocktail server Gloria Harris, a 28-year Golden Gate veteran said she couldn't rely on her employer to provide quality health coverage.

"They change their health insurance like they change their shirts," Harris said.

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