Unions Planning Attack on Disney Hotel Dress Code

Union representatives for workers at the Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim, where a strict new appearance code prohibits mustaches, beards, heavy makeup and long fingernails, said Thursday that several employee unions will join in a common attack on the policy.

Lewis Levy, an attorney for Operating Engineers Local 501, a 40-member union in contract negotiations with the hotel, said Local 501, Service Employees Union Local 399 and a union representing painters will form a task force to “cooperate on legal matters and file arbitration and grievance procedures” against the policy.

Workers at the hotel, previously owned by the Wrather Corp., fell under the new rules--the same ones that apply to Disneyland employees--when the hotel was sold in January to Walt Disney Co. and Industrial Equity (Pacific) Limited of Hong Kong.

Many hotel employees have argued that the dress code is unfair and have vowed to ignore it.