Unionized workers reach ‘life-changing’ agreement with Hotel Maya
The new contract includes a $5 per hour raise in the first year, with most non-tipped workers on track to make $35 per hour by July 2027.
After nearly 10 months of picket lines, disruptions and reported scandals, Hotel Maya reached a tentative, “life-changing” agreement for a new labor contract, union representatives said Tuesday.
Unite Here Local 11 announced the Long Beach hotel, along with six others in the region, signed onto the agreement.
“The Hotel Maya and Unite Here Local 11 are pleased to announce we have reached a fair settlement of our dispute,” the groups said in a joint statement.
The new contract includes a $5-per-hour raise in the first year, giving workers an additional $10,400 annually, according to the union. Non-tipped workers will see 40-50% wage increases over the next 4.5 years, with most room attendants set to earn $35 per hour by July 1, 2027.
The contract also guarantees pre-pandemic staffing levels, one of the highest-paid pension plans for service workers in the nation and 50 pages of improvements such as additional holidays and “unprecedented” language related to worker treatment and immigrant rights, according to the union.
The announcement comes on the heels of ratification votes at 35 other hotels late last month.
The agreement expires on January 15, 2028, months before the Olympics bring a slew of business to Los Angeles County and its hospitality industry.
The road to this agreement was long and highly controversial. More than 10,000 workers at 52 hotels throughout the region have struck 170 times since the beginning of July last year, the union said, making it the largest strike in the history of the nation’s hospitality industry.
“My coworkers and I dealt with unthinkable violence to get to this point,” Camila Delgado, a housekeeper at the waterfront hotel, said in a statement. “We are proud that we never gave up, and we look forward to having the same standard-raising benefits and protections other hotel workers now enjoy.”
During a protest outside the Maya in August of last year, workers clashed with wedding guests and security guards. During a rally, several people attempted to forcefully move picketing workers using temporary fences, video shows. Workers stood their ground, but four people were assaulted by an unidentified man allegedly not affiliated with the hotel or wedding party.
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In December, Delgado alleged an investor in the hotel assaulted her while she picketed. The investor, identified as Frank Zarabi, denied the accusation that he hit Degado’s hand and threw her megaphone to the ground outside the hotel.
A spokesperson for Zarabi at the time said he was targeted by workers in the hopes of creating a scandal. The incident caused Zarabi to have a severe panic attack, they claimed.
In February, Mayor Rex Richardson voiced concerns over what he called a “disturbing pattern of violence” at the hotel in a letter to Michael Moskowitz and Kambiz Babaoff, CEO and chairman, respectively, of Ensemble Investments, the company that owns the Maya.
In their joint statement, the hotel and union said the new settlement “includes a commitment from all parties to engage in a good-faith reconciliation process.”
“The workers at the Maya and the newly settled hotels are heroes,” Unite Here Local 11 co-president Kurt Petersen said in a statement. “Despite living precariously close to being unhoused, they struck over and over without pay to win a living wage.”
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