Mondrian Hotel to Settle Suit by 9 Fired Bellmen

The swank Mondrian Hotel has agreed to pay $1.08 million to a group of mostly minority bellmen who were fired and replaced with 15 “cool-looking” white workers days before the Sunset Strip landmark’s reopening in 1996, parties to the settlement said Tuesday.

Each of the nine bellboys will receive about $120,000 over three years, according to the Aug. 3 settlement of a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleging the firings were race-based.

The West Hollywood hotel, home of the ultra-hip Sky Bar and a de rigueur gathering spot for the Hollywood glitterati, is one of several posh establishments owned by former Studio 54 co-proprietor Ian Schrager.

A handwritten memo in which Schrager wrote that certain hotel restaurant employees were “too ethnic” was among the EEOC’s evidence, according to court documents. Schrager explained in a subsequent deposition that what he really meant was that some of the employees had too many tattoos.

A spokesman for Schrager said the celebrated hotelier did not want to discuss the case, referring instead to a joint statement scheduled to be released by the parties to the suit today.

“This is a hotel that appeals to people who consider themselves very hip, very modern, very cool,” said Kathleen Mulligan, one of the EEOC attorneys who handled the case. “The idea here is that people have the wrong idea of what the face of discrimination looks like. In Los Angeles, people are very conscious of being modern and up to date and ahead of the curve and the rest of the country. Discrimination is not cool, and it’s not modern. Maybe people aren’t realizing that this is still a real issue in an economy that’s going well and in a city which considers itself ahead of the curve.”

The hotel has taken steps, including hiring a human resources manager, to ensure compliance with fair employment laws, according to Mondrian General Manager David Weidlich.

“We are pleased we were able to reach an accord with the EEOC,” Weidlich said. “We have no desire to invest legal fees, time and effort in fighting when we share the agency’s goals. We feel badly that these former employees were lost in the chaos of the reopening and that their discharge may not have been handled as sensitively as it could have been.”

But Mulligan said, “The real test is going to be obviously if you see a change in the complexion in the people who work in the visible jobs at the Mondrian. The question is when you look at the Mondrian who do you see working there in front--not the people who clean the rooms--but who’s in front and in management.”

Terminated workers said they hoped the payout would teach the hotel a lesson.

“We’re very happy,” said Ben Ison, a 47-year-old Filipino who worked for the hotel for seven years before being fired. “We fight for the right. It’s very important for us.

“We worked there for a very long time but . . . we weren’t the Hollywood look,” Ison said. “Everybody knows we have excellent service.”

Schrager came to national prominence in the late 1970s as one of the co-owners of Studio 54. He spent 13 months in federal prison on tax-evasion charges along with the late Steve Rubell, his partner in Studio 54. Schrager left the nightclub business and has become one of the most successful hotel owners in the world. Ian Schrager Hotels owns Morgans, Royalton and Paramount hotels in New York, Sandersons and St. Martin’s Lane in London, Delano in Miami, Mirimar in Santa Barbara and Clift in San Francisco.

The settlement, which was worked out in a mandatory conference attended by the nine former employees and Schrager, avoids a trial that was set for October.

Mulligan said none of the bellmen had been criticized for any serious work shortcomings. “There’s no demonstrated performance issues, yet all of them were let go,” she said. “When you go from a 90% minority work group to a 100% white work group that’s pretty stark.”

The Mondrian, a 1950s apartment building operated as a hotel since 1983, had been in bankruptcy for several years when Schrager bought it in 1995. It made its mark on the star-studded Sunset Strip scene Dec. 10, 1996, when it reopened after a renovation, with such chic additions as the Sky Bar.

That was four days after the nine bellmen, who also worked as valets, were let go. Eight of the nine had worked there for more than seven years for minimum wage plus tips. Of the nine plaintiffs, two were Latino, three were Filipino, two were Cambodian, one was black and one was white, according to court documents.

The EEOC alleged that the white bellhop, Rich Brand, was fired because he was associated with the minority bellmen.

“I wouldn’t want this to happen to anybody else,” said Brand, 29, of Toluca Lake.

Brand said the bellmen lost tips when bookings dropped off during the nine-month renovation. For about half of that period, while the lobby was under construction, all bags had to be carried up a flight of stairs, he said. The bellmen had been told that if they stuck with the hotel their lot would improve because the new look would win business back and attract a better clientele.

When the fired bellmen saw their replacements were all white, they got together and decided to file a complaint with the EEOC, Brand said. “We never even imagined it would be as big as it turned out to be.”

“The EEOC thought it was an important case,” said Anat Ehrlich, another attorney with the agency. “The EEOC felt it was egregious, which is why we pursued the lawsuit.”

The EEOC alleged in its complaint that in preparation for the reopening, the hotel’s all-white management and recruitment team based its hiring on subjective criteria, specifically whether or not the applicants were “pretty,” “handsome” or “cool.”

In addition, the Mondrian practiced what EEOC called “highly unorthodox recruiting methods” for the bellmen and front-desk positions, including advertising in Variety and other entertainment trade publications. In addition, the managers took instant photographs of the applicants.

Angela Oh, a local lecturer and lawyer who has dealt with racial issues, said the situation at the Mondrian may have been an example of “rationalized racism.” Mondrian managers, in their pursuit of “cool” may not have recognized that they were discriminating against their employees.

“They were looking for a certain type of image that had nothing to do with race,” Oh said. “It really sounds like a class thing operating, which is defining what is cool.”

EEOC officials said they believe the hotel has tried to fix the problem.

Joe Hicks, executive director of the city of Los Angeles Human Relations Commission, said he didn’t understand how hiring white people and firing minorities could in any way help make the hotel more “cool.”

“I just find that odd. I don’t think Angelenos equate white people with coolness,” Hicks said.

In the end, the settlement is a lesson to all employers.

“Discrimination certainly will not be winked at or allowed,” Hicks said. “The message gets sent that if we catch you discriminating you will be punished.”