By Frank Cho
Advertiser Staff Writer
The trustee who took control of the embattled Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Local 5 AFL-CIO has named controversial former financial secretary-treasurer Tony Rutledge and several supporters to key positions in upcoming labor negotiations with hotels.
Union officials say the appointments are intended to show a united front during contract negotiations. But after months of acrimony, some say working together may be even harder than the negotiations.
"It’s uneasy for everybody," said Arlene Ilae, a former union senior vice president and a Rutledge supporter who was hired back this week. "But it’s good to be back. We will do anything we can to help get things moving again and help the members."
The move brings a level of experience back to Local 5’s negotiating committee that some members complained it lacked during previous meetings. Rutledge lost an election last April to union upstart Eric Gill for Local 5’s top job. After the election, however, infighting between Gill and Rutledge supporters brought the union nearly to a standstill.
Local 5 was put into trusteeship by the union’s Washington, D.C.-based international governing body last week. Sherri Chiesa, the international’s western regional director who was appointed trustee, removed all the union’s elected officials including Ilae and Gill.
But in meetings between Rutledge and international union officials prior to Chiesa’s arrival last week, union officials agreed to name Rutledge and some of his supporters to the negotiating committee, union officials said.
Chiesa, who was traveling on the Mainland last night, could not be reached for comment.
Local 5’s hotel and restaurant workers had voted 1,435 to 330 last month to reject the Council of Hawai‘i Hotel’s final offer to settle the Master Hotel Agreement, the biggest single hotel labor contract. That agreement expired Feb. 29, 2000, and covered about 4,600 dues-paying members at the Hilton Hawaiian Village, Hyatt Regency Waikiki, Sheraton-Waikiki, Sheraton Princess Ka‘iulani and Sheraton Moana Surfrider Hotel.
Between now and December, another eight hotel contracts will come up for renegotiation, Ilae said.
Gill agreed yesterday that the priority will be to do what is best for the union membership and settle those contracts. "She (Chiesa) is asking all of us to show unity and sit together for the negotiations," said Gill, who has tried to keep Rutledge out of some of the biggest hotel contract negotiations.
Local 5 is preparing to go back to the bargaining table to negotiate a master agreement that typically is a bellwether that most other hotels will use in their own negotiations with the 10,000-member unit.
Rutledge, who still is a vice president with the international union despite losing his Local 5 seat, said his 14 years of experience running the union will be helpful to the trustee’s negotiating committee. "I got the history and that is very important for bargaining," Rutledge said.
As for working with Gill, Rutledge said getting a contract for union members is more important to him. "I have a lot of problems working with him (Gill), but for the negotiations we will be on the same side," Rutledge said.
Frank Cho can be reached by phone at 525-8088, or by e-mail at fcho@honoluluadvertiser.com
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