Disneyland Hotel, Union at an Impasse

Labor talks between the Disneyland Hotel and union officials broke off Friday as a midnight strike deadline passed, but a walkout by 1,200 workers still was not imminent.

“We have not called a strike yet,” union president David L. Shultz said. “We’re going to begin picketing at noon. . . . We think me might get it done without taking people off their work if we annoy them enough.”

The union’s negotiating team rejected the hotel’s final offer at about noon Friday, said Bill Granfield, a spokesman for the Hotel Employees & Restaurant Employees International Union.

“The hotel was notified of the rejection by David Shultz. If they indicate any willingness to talk, we’re ready to talk,” Granfield said Friday evening.

Hotel management is willing to sit down and clarify its position, but the hotel is “not going to change its position,” said Ric Morris, the hotel’s labor relations director.

“We’ve really made the decision that we have provided that which is possible for the hotel to provide for the employees. We’ll certainly clarify, if that is needed, but we’ve reached kind of an end.”

Friday Night Vigil

At the union’s Garden Grove office, picket signs, banners and leaflets were being prepared Friday. Schultz estimated that about 200 people held a vigil Friday night in front of the hotel, while in Long Beach, some members distributed leaflets near the Spruce Goose.

The talks affect maids, bartenders, waitresses, cooks and other employees, who make up more than half the hotel’s 2,000 workers.

Morris said that management is prepared to assume the duties of any person on strike to avoid any decrease in hotel services. Already, more than 1,000 people have been recruited, screened, and put through the hotel’s orientation in case a strike is called, he said.

“On Saturday, I expect this hotel to be running very well,” he said.

Granfield said the union membership had authorized the strike in a vote last Saturday. But Morris said many hotel employees told him Friday that they were promised another vote before any strike could be called by union officials.

Resignation Letters

Almost 150 employees drafted letters of resignation from the union Friday in protest and asked that the letters be put in their personnel files, Morris said.

“People are very upset that they were not given the opportunity for another vote. I have had many employees come up to me and say it’s a good contract offer,” he said.

But Granfield said: “We haven’t seen any letters of resignation. Frankly, I think they’re a fantasy. As for the vote, I think it’s a ploy. The hotel would love to have us holding a last-minute vote just to delay us from taking any action.”

The fight pits one of Orange County’s finest hotels, a 30-year-old, four-star-rated establishment, against one of Southern California’s larger unions.

The 1,124-room hotel is virtually a mini-city, housing shops and seven restaurants. It is independent of nearby Disneyland and is owned by the Wrather Corp. of Beverly Hills, which also operates the Spruce Goose and Queen Mary in Long Beach.

Granfield said the hotel wants the union to agree to a contract clause that would pay employees the same wage rate as other, smaller hotels where the union is the bargaining agent.

Union Demands

Top hourly wages range from $3.90 for waitress and bus boys to $4.60 for maids and more than $6 for cooks.

The union is asking for raises ranging from 30 to 60 cents an hour, while the hotel is suggesting no increases for food service employees and up to a 30-cent raise for others.

While some labor officials predicted that a strike “may cripple” hotel services, Morris said, “every restaurant will be open. People will be checked in, and they will have clean rooms and can expect the same four-star, four-diamond-rated service they have become accustomed to.”

Union members, like Marian Mahoney, 28, a single parent who is a waitress in a hotel coffee shop, said they are prepared, if necessary, to strike.

“I told my 7-year-old son that when you grow up and go to work that at some time in your life you may have to fight about something you feel very strongly about; I told him Mommy is doing that now,” Mahoney said.

Mahoney said she has worked at the hotel for seven years and earns about $3.95 an hour plus tips.

Under the hotel’s final offer, waitresses’ wages would be frozen for two years and then would increase 7 1/2 cents an hour in the third and fourth years.

Times staff writer Nancy Wride contributed to this article.