BOSTON — The “Make them pay!” chants, blaring air horns and drumming of the UNITE HERE Local 26 strikers can be heard blocks away from the Downtown Theater District here. Three weeks into their strike at the Hilton Park Plaza hotel, workers are keeping the picket line strong.
“The Omni contract is a great thing, a win for hotel workers and our union. They won all six of their demands,” Lotfi Mokrane, a strike captain for Local 26, told the Militant. The contract ratified Oct. 20 by almost 700 hotel workers at the Omni Boston at the Seaport and Omni Parker House hotels includes a $10 raise for non-tip workers and $5 for tipped workers over the course of the four-year contract. It also includes pension and health care improvements, better job protection and the Juneteenth holiday.
Some 600 UNITE HERE members are still on strike at the Hilton Park Plaza and Hilton Boston Logan Airport hotels, part of the 4,400 union hotel workers on strike nationally today.
“We just need to stay firm,” Alberto Hernandez, a bellhop with 25 years at the Park Plaza, said. “We are way behind hotel workers in other cities, and Boston has one of the highest costs of living in the U.S.”