SEARCH NEWS:

 

Union Job Plan Languishes

LAS VEGAS, Nevada – Oct. 10, 2001 -- Las Vegas casino operators have not responded to a Culinary Local 226 plan that would see casino workers reduce their schedules by 20 percent to create part-time jobs for recently laid-off union members.

The plan was adopted in response to the elimination of an estimated 15,000 casino industry jobs since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and an ensuing dropoff in worldwide travel.

Union organizers pushed the proposal as a temporary plan to create work and sent letters to personnel directors at the 40 casinos that have contracts with the 50,000-member union.

"There's been one or two inquiries and that's about it," said Culinary staff director D. Taylor. "Nothing has transpired. This is our hope to get people back to work.

"Frankly, (the casinos) were not obliged to agree to it, and we will continue to work at that."

One top Strip executive said Tuesday the plan was issued too late in the lay-off process for it to be adopted by casino companies attempting to counter the financial effects of the drastic decline in travel.

"When our business got cut in half overnight we had to take action. We had to do it quickly," said MGM Mirage spokesman Alan Feldman, whose company has let go 6,000 of 38,000 jobs. "If you don't sell a room on Monday you can't sell it on Tuesday to make up for it."

Not all of Clark County's 190 casinos have eliminated jobs, although a large percentage have reduced work schedules to recover lost revenues.

The city's hotel occupancy rate is projected at 78 percent for the five-day period ending Thursday, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. That's 10 percentage points below the normal midweek occupancy rate for this time of year, but a dramatic increase from the mid-50 percent figure recorded in the first full week after the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Weekend occupancy rates have continued a rebound from the 40 percent to 50 percent figures recorded during the first Friday and Saturday after the attacks. That figure grew to 97 percent this past weekend, according to the authority.

The improved results have prompted MGM Mirage and Park Place Entertainment to rehire a small percentage of their workers who lost jobs. That has translated to the addition of about 200 part-time positions at the MGM Grand, where an estimated 1,500 positons were cut.

But average nightly room rates remain below normal throughout much of the city, as hotel operators price to fill their rooms, and thousands remain without any prospect for immediate rehire.

Union leaders and social service workers fear that a wave of evictions is about to begin in the coming days, as the newly unemployed are unable to make monthly rent payments.

Between Wednesday and Monday, the United Way of Southern Nevada gave $175,000 to area residents to help as many as 550 families remain in their homes, signaling a need that is much higher than normal.

"It's somewhere between being under siege and being on a crusade," United Way of Southern Nevada President Garth Winckler said of the demand his organization faces.

In July, August and September, a total of 1,621 to 1,736 people were evicted monthly from their homes, said Las Vegas Constable Robert Gronauer, noting that he was unable to project how much that number will grow in the coming weeks. "I believe there will be an influx," he said. "But the number? I don't know."

< Gaming News