CHICAGO— Under pressure from Illinois Gov. George Ryan to reach a settlement, area hotel workers here tentatively agreed to a new contract on Sept. 3 that will give them wage increases of more than 11% for each of the next four years. The agreement avoids a strike by 7,300 hotel service employees represented by the Hotel and Restaurant Employees International Union (HERE) just days before one of the citys biggest conventions of the year— the manufacturing technology show. The union’s negotiating committee voted 57-1 to recommend the contract for ratification by the full membership. A vote by the members has not yet been scheduled. Union leaders said the contract provides average pay levels of about $0.10 more per hour than the offer rejected late last week by the negotiating committee. The first year of the contract would cost hotel operators about $15.5 million more for wages and benefits, according to the union’s calculations. But the contract falls far short of the union’s original goal of boosting wages and benefits to the same level as New York City, where some hotel workers earn as much as $18 an hour. Under the new contract, Chicago workers who don’t typically receive tips would get a $3.27 an hour raise over the next four years. That would boost a maid’s salary to $12.10 an hour. Hourly wages for tipped employees, like waiters, would climb $0.50 in the first year and $0.30 for each of the next three years. The contract also would lower employees’ health insurance premiums from $85 per month to $30 a month by the end of the contract term. And for the first time, hotel workers would receive four days of paid sick time and a 15-minute paid rest break. The Chicago governor noted that a hotel strike would have devastated Chicago’s economy and disrupted the state’s perilous financial condition by interrupting the flow of tax revenue generated by tourism. SOURCE: Crains Chicago Business
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