SEARCH NEWS:

 

Stratosphere Dealers Reject Union

LAS VEGAS -- Stratosphere table games dealers have at least temporarily ended their relationship with a New York-based union in a move that one organizer argues is the result of a stacked deck.

Workers at the tower-themed megaresort voted 112-105 Saturday to decertify the Transport Workers Union of America, which was in the midst of negotiations with Stratosphere management.

Tim Grandfield, the union's international organizing director, argued Monday that Stratosphere bosses have hired 97 part-time dealers during the past year to bolster the property's anti-union forces.

A year ago, the casino's 193 dealers voted 116-48 in favor of a TWU organizing effort with 29 dealers abstaining, Grandfield said.

Saturday's results saw the property's 290 dealers vote 112-105 to drop the union, with 73 abstentions, he noted.

The additional hirings at billionaire Carl Icahn's Stratosphere came as competing Strip operators cut jobs to recoup profits lost to the post-Sept. 11 travel decline, sparking skepticism from union organizers about the additions - especially in light of Icahn's reputation for caring for little beyond the bottom line.

Grandfield said he expects an appeal of Saturday's results to the National Labor Relations Board, although he could not offer specific reasons for an NLRB reversal of the outcome.

"We're questioning the numbers, which we are," Grandfield simply said.

Word of the close weekend vote was confirmed Monday by Stratosphere spokesman Mike Gilmartin, who declined to comment. The property's chief operating officer, Rich Brown, failed to return a phone message seeking comment.

The vote came three weeks after the 115,000-member union negotiated an agreement for New Frontier dealers - the city's first ever for dealers - that had no monetary value and left management granting few concessions.

The typical dealer at an aging Strop property earns about $35,000 annually, union organizers say. A dealer at the high-end Bellagio earns about $65,000. Tips generate about 70 percent of all dealers' income.

Grandfield has characterized the union's three-year deal at the New Frontier as "a successful opening volley in a 12-month effort to organize Strip dealers."

"If the New Frontier had money, we could have gotten money out of that property," Grandfield said. "This is a foundation. It's never happened before."

The New Frontier agreement calls for dealer wages to be frozen at current levels for two years and New Frontier executives will retain control over seniority and grievance issues.

Grandfield said a Stratosphere deal would see dealers receive a pay boost.

"They're making money," Grandfield said of the tower-themed property. "The economics (compared with) the New Frontier deal are actually different."

Casino industry executives have long opposed the unionization of Las Vegas dealers, fearing that such a move would add an additional layer of bureaucracy between management and money-handling dealers.

At-will firing of dealers provides a powerful stick for managers seeking to penalize dealers who irritate high rollers or floor bosses, and executives fear that unionization will cut the power of managers whose power is measured in their ability to hire, fire and reassign.

Yet it is unclear whether a majority of the city's estimated 30,000 dealers want to be unionized, industry observers say. While some might believe they have been penalized by the current system, others have thrived.

Pro-Transport Workers votes failed at eight Las Vegas hotel-casinos, including the Monte Carlo, Las Vegas Hilton and MGM Grand.

The Stratosphere, Phil Ruffins' New Frontier and Aztar's Tropicana, a third property where dealers authorized the union to negotiate on their behalf, were considered early victories, but dealers at the New Frontier have been the only ones to negotiate a contract.

Strip observers have speculated that the Teamsters Union could push to unionize Monte Carlo dealers, but Teamsters and Transport Workers leaders have struck a deal leaving the Las Vegas organizing effort to the Transport Workers.

< Gaming News