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# Hotel settles labor dispute with union
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/hotel-settles-labor-dispute-with-union/
- Published: 2003-02-20T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T01:38:05.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Business, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*But both sides expect larger battle to continue*

*By JASON AUSLANDER Daily Press Staff Writer*

Management of a local hotel recently signed an agreement with the National Labor Relations Board pledging to uphold federal laws governing the formation of unions.

And while the settlement officially ends a two-year, polarizing dispute between the Doubletree Guest Suites Hotel and the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union Local 11, neither party expects it to mark the end of the battle.

“Come on, this is Santa Monica,” said Francois Khoury, Doubletree general manager. “For every two citizens, we have five activists. (The union) is going to find something else tomorrow and the day after that and the day after that.”

> “Come on, this is Santa Monica. For every two citizens, we have five activists.” — — FRANCOIS KHOURY Doubletree Guest Suites Hotel

While the agreement is a step forward, the ultimate goal is for the Doubletree to allow an official employee vote on the establishment of a union, said Kurt Petersen, the union’s organizing director.

37F,“That is how other (local) hotels have done it,” he said. “That is the standard in Santa Monica and we think they should follow it.”

Under terms of the NLRB agreement — signed Jan. 28 by a Doubletree attorney and Feb. 7 by the union — the hotel does not admit breaking any laws.

The hotel’s management did agree, however, to post a notice informing employees of their federal rights to form or not form a union, wear union buttons or insignia, discuss union issues in the workplace and to remain on the premises more than 30 minutes after their shift ends. The hotel also agreed to remove disciplinary action taken against a pro-union employee.

Khoury said all the company actually did was agree to follow the law, which it has always done.

“There’s not much to it,” he said.

The dispute has cost the Doubletree hundreds of thousands of dollars, he said, declining to cite a specific amount.

Had the dispute gone to a hearing with the labor relations board, “we knew we would win,” Khoury said.

Petersen — who said the hotel settled shortly before the hearing with the NLRB was scheduled — disagreed.

“The reason they settled was because they knew they would lose,” he said. “If they thought they were right, I don’t think this hotel would have done anything but fight.”

> “The reason they settled was because they knew they would lose. If they thought they were right, I don’t think this hotel would have done anything but fight.” — — KURT PETERSEN Union organizing director

Those opinions are characteristic of the charged rhetoric that has flown between the two sides — particularly during the buildup to last November’s elections, when Santa Monica’s “living wage” law was narrowly defeated by voters.

The law would have guaranteed higher wages and benefits for workers at businesses in the city’s coastal zone that make over $5 million a year. The proposal failed in part to a multi-million dollar campaign against it led by the hotel industry, according to living wage supporters.

“This is the same hotel that spent $50,000 to fight the living wage law,” Petersen said. “The Doubletree’s goal is to keep (workers’ standard of living) down as much as possible.”

Khoury dismissed that argument and said any attempt to link the living wage with the labor agreement is a case of sour grapes by the union.

“It’s more an embarrassment to them because they lost,” he said.

Petersen and other union officials have long charged the hotel with intimidating employees interested in establishing a union. Conversely, the hotel’s management maintains that it’s union officials who harass employees, sometimes at their homes.

Khoury said that if his employees wanted to establish a union, they would have done so already.

However, if that is true, Petersen asked, why won’t the hotel agree to allow its employees to be officially polled in a process called a card-check election.

“There is no question the employees want a union,” he said. “The reason the hotel won’t allow it is because they don’t want to share profits.”

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 20, 2003.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/022003.pdf?ref=smdp.com)