Anaheim : Union Says ‘Rats’ to Contractor of New Marriott Hotel

Union officials in Orange County--angry over the hiring of non-union and out-of-state labor to build a Marriott hotel in Newport Beach--led more than 100 hard hat and blue jean-clad construction workers in a demonstration Thursday at the Anaheim Marriott hotel.

While picketing workers distributed pamphlets to the hotel’s arriving guests and urged them not to patronize Marriott hotels, a midget in a 3 1/2-foot-tall rat suit stomped on a construction worker’s hard hat to symbolize the union-busting practices of the hotel’s contractor, a union representative said.

Pickets also urged arriving guests to call the hotel chain’s toll-free reservation number to complain about the labor dispute.

A Marriott spokesman said the hotel will not involve itself in the dispute between the union and the contractor. “It has nothing to do with us,” he said.

The contractor, Doster Construction Co. of Birmingham, Ala., is building Newport Beach’s second Marriott, a 254-suite, $20-million structure on the corner of Jamboree Road and Bristol Street.

“We are perfectly within our rights and I don’t believe we’re stepping on anyone’s toes or violating anyone’s rights,” Doster Vice President Pat Leech said. “There’s nothing unusual in the way this (hotel) is being constructed.”

While admitting that the contractor has done nothing illegal, officials of the union, the Building and Construction Trades Council of Orange County, said that with union labor, money is usually set aside for a variety of employee benefits.

“It’s unfair because our families are left with no medical coverage, no benefits, nothing,” said Robert L. Balgenorth, the union’s executive secretary.

Balgenorth said the construction company hired a third of its 30 to 40 construction laborers presently on the site from a pool of unemployed, non-union workers from outside California.

The union hired an actor from the Screen Actors Guild to parade outside the Anaheim Marriott in the rat costume during the demonstration to represent the contractor, Balgenorth said.