by Brian Donahue
Current and former Woodfin Suites Hotel workers, cheated out of $200,000 in wages by the company, won a major victory Thursday when the Emeryville City Council ordered the hotel to make good on its debt. The Council rejected Woodfin’s appeal of the city manager’s finding in 2006, ordering the hotel to pay the additional wages to comply with city ordinance. Failure to comply would result in the Woodfin being denied a renewal of its permit to operate.
In a 2-2 vote, the Council rejected Woodfin’s argument that it is in compliance with Measure C, a 2004 initiative that established a “living wage” for workers at Emeryville hotels, and also set guidelines for working conditions. The hotel needed a majority to win its appeal.
The Thursday council vote capped a marathon five-day hearing — yet another skirmish in the war of attrition between supervisors and hotel room cleaners that has dragged on since activists began gathering signatures for Measure C four years ago.
“Its bad business,” Council Member John Fricke said after the meeting. “They’ve already spent more on fighting this than what the workers are asking for.”
Fricke and Council Member Ruth Atkin voted in favor of the workers. Mayor Dick Kassis and Council Member Nora Davis voted against the workers, and in favor of the Woodfin and its owner, Sam Hardage, former chairman of the San Diego County Republican Party and major Republican fundraiser.
Drama reached a crescendo when Woodfin attorneys accused Fricke and Vice Mayor Ken Bukowski of a pro-worker bias and asked them to recuse themselves. Bukowski agreed, but Fricke refused, stating that he harbored no such bias and could vote objectively.
The Woodfin has consistently argued that room cleaners are not owed the $200,000 in pay because they received help with their work from supervisors. When asked to elaborate, Woodfin attorneys said that supervisors helped clean the rooms “with their eyes and their heads,” and therefore the wages owed to rank-and-file employees are considerably lower.
Woodfin Suites Hotels, a privately held company, was founded by CEO Hardage, who earned the rank of “pioneer” in the 2004 George Bush re-election campaign by raising more than $100,000 in contributions. In 2008, Hardage raised about the same amount for Arizona Sen. John McCain‘s presidential bid. Hardage also was a major contributor to the re-election campaign of Randy “Duke” Cuningham, now serving time in federal prison for accepting kick-backs from military contractors.
A Christian evangelical, Hardage may wish to re-read the biblical story of David and Goliath and discern its meaning.
As someone who lived at the Woodfin for years while our condo in Emeryville was fixed, I find the Woodfin’s manager’s assertions that their housemen and supervisors did a significant portion of the cleaning in the rooms to be…complete balderdash!
It’s hard to believe that two members of the council voted for the Woodfin. I would have thought the insults the Woodfin lawyers were busy slinging at the Council would have been enough to stop that vote. But besides the insults, the fact that there was any support for the Woodfin is laughable–they were breaking the law and ignoring the will of the people. Better take note, ignoring the will of the people is a little old.
Right or wrong this “article” is a pretty poor attempt at neutrality. That last line was pathetic. Talk about biased reporting.
As an Emeryville resident I’ve been keeping my eye on this so called news source to see how it pans out but from what I’ve been reading it’s basically a platform for yet another group to spout its opinions, not to provide unbiased news and information on the city itself.
I do not understand how one can find it hard that two of the members voted in favor. Take a look at the past donations made to these council members. Most of these council members are only wanting to help the businesses of Emeryville.
I am not against businesses, but I am against dishing out subsidies to all these developers and ignoring codes. This type of government is essentially raping the residents of any positive improvements so that business only continues to thrive.
We can have a happy medium and that should be where our council members should head.
After the Measure C election was adapted by the people, Dick Kassis and Nora Davis (and Ken Bukowski) said that even though they worked hard against the Measure, they would honor the will of the people and work to impliment it. It looks like their pro-business philosophy beat out their principles again. At least they’re consistant!
The comment from 1/23 is spot on! I’m glad others have noticed too. The creators of The Secret News originally claimed to be creating an alternative news source to the Emeryville Connection, which they saw as biased toward business. Instead of creating a unbiased alternative, they have created an equally biased alternative with a different bias. Turns out the real alternative is inemeryville a project of six Berkeley journalism graduate students, which actually does provide unbiased local news.
The Chamber of Comerce newspaper is biased in favor of business, the Secret News is biased in favor of Emeryville residents. Maybe people should read both. For me, I’d rather read a news source with the resident’s interests in mind.
One thing I’ve noticed about the Emeryville Chamber rag, “The Connection.” They don’t allow feedback in the same way that the Secret News does. None whatsoever. Believe me, I’ve tried. No “letters to the editor.” What are they scared of?
If the publishers of the “Secret News” get their way, Emeryville residents will see their city services slashed and fees increase because no business in their right mind will locate in Emeryville!
It’s a race to the bottom everyone! We can’t ask for a better town then what the developers want to give us because they’ll leave. The problem with Emeryville is all these people who keep trying to make a better place for the residents…they’re really just trying to chase away the developers. They’re what Bush would call ‘unpatriotic’.
This is like the arguement that the problem with American workers is that they’re paid too much. If corporations can get workers overseas to do the same work for less, then it’s obvious Americans need to lower their wages. How’s $2 a day sound everyone?