Week-long Hyatt strike continues

Hyatt workers in Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Honolulu continue their week-long strike. While Hyatt management wants the discussion to focus entirely on wages and benefits, the workers are also concerned about workplace safety given that Hyatt housekeepers have higher injury rates than housekeepers at other hotel chains.

Unite Here's Hotel Workers Rising highlights what some of the workers have to say. Victoria Guillen, from San Francisco, says:

I'm fighting for the women who work for Hyatt, especially the housekeepers and dishwashers and the women who are pregnant or have children. I'm a dishwasher at the Grand Hyatt. Hyatt tried to fire me because I couldn't return to work three days after a C-section. My co-workers fought for me to keep my job. Now I'm fighting for all the women who face abuse from Hyatt managers the way I did.

Cathy Youngblood, from Los Angeles, says:

I'm a Hyatt housekeeper picketing today because I don't mind working hard but I won't be abused. When I arrived at the Hyatt, I could smell the injustice. I believe in hard work but living in pain is a different story. I have to take medication regularly because my wrists and shoulders hurt from having to lift mattresses to change the sheets. Since I started working at the Hyatt my quality of life has diminished greatly. Hyatt must stop abusing housekeepers.

In addition to the strike, Unite Here has called a boycott of some Hyatt hotels.

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