LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — By blocking a major Las Vegas road, hundreds of drivers were stunned to learn a union protest was the cause—some sympathetic, others running late.
Hundreds of Culinary Union 226 members protested ongoing contract negotiations Wednesday night at the intersection of University Center Drive and East Tropicana Avenue. The intersection was temporarily closed to northbound traffic leaving Harry Reid International Airport in response from protestors to around 10 airport businesses.
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“They’ve hired an anti-union attorney, and said, ‘We want a 40% reduction than what the other employers pay that have signed a good contract,’” Tedd Papageorge, Culinary Union 226 Secretary-Treasurer, said. “And these workers just aren’t going to stand for that.”
The airport businesses at the center of the negotiation have about 400 union workers, according to Papageorge. After multiple bargaining sessions, the union members voted on a protest action.
“For over four years, these employers that employ these 400 workers are paying substandard for healthcare, substandard for pension, and three to $4 an hour less in wages,” he said. “We all know what’s happened here in Las Vegas, it’s hard to make a living now.”…