Supporters of the Raise L.A. coalition celebrate a vote of the Los Angeles city council in September 2014. Under the new law, large nonunion hotels in Los Angeles would raise their minimum wage to $15.37 by 2015. The campaign was part of a multi-year strategy led by LAANE and UNITE HERE Local 11 to establish a living wage across the hotel industry. Hotel industry representatives complained that high wages would lead to unemployment for workers. Worker advocates pointed to the large profits of corporate hotels and tax subsidies provide by the city as justification for the higher wage mandate. A representative of LAANE told the L.A. Times, “When employers are saying jobs are going to be lost, they’re really saying, ‘We want to continue to have high profits, so we’re going to fire people.'”
Zahniser, David, and Emily Alpert Reyes. “City Council Backs Wage Hike for Hotel Employees; Lawmakers Approve Raising Minimum Pay to $15.37 an Hour, despite Fears It Will Lead to Job Losses.” Los Angeles Times, September 25, 2014, sec. LATExtra; Part AA; Metro Desk. https://www.proquest.com/latimes/docview/1564540698/abstract/D4140E13177542D6PQ/48.
In September 2006, UNITE HERE Local 11 organized what was likely the largest act of civil disobedience in Los Angeles History. Union members, faith leaders, elected officials, and community allies joined in a large march to protest low wages at corporate hotels along Century Blvd outside of Los Angeles International Airport. The protest demonstrated the union’s ability to build a broad coalition in support of worker and immigrant right at a time when the union was negotiating with hotel employers over a new contract. Building on the themes of the spring 2006 immigrant rights marches, Century Blvd. marchers also evoked the civil rights movement. The slogan “I am a Human Being” echoed the famous message Memphis sanitation workers strikers of 1968, “I am a Man.” Over 300 demonstrators were arrested by Los Angeles Police and bused to Van Nuys for processing. Produced by UNITE-HERE Local 11, this film combines TV news footage, interviews, and street scenes to document the union’s mass action on Century Blvd.
Mathews, Joe. “The State; A Plan for Very Civil Disobedience; Police and Union Will Follow a Script, Which Even Specifies Who Will Be Arrested, in a March near LAX to Organize Hotel Workers.: [HOME EDITION].” Los Angeles Times; Los Angeles, Calif., September 28, 2006, sec. Main News; Part A; Metro Desk. http://search.proquest.com/latimes/docview/422186033/abstract/3B85F37323DB4A3CPQ/13.
On May 1, 2006 hundreds of thousands marched in Los Angeles and other large U.S. cities in support of immigrant rights. Called by many “A Day without an Immigrant,” the May Day protests were the culmination of months of planning in response to a punitive immigration bill that passed the U.S. House of Representatives (H.R. 4437). This video is from the Los Angeles Independent Media Center (IMC, http://la.indymedia.org/news/2006/05/156112.php). Independent media in LA and elsewhere was an important venue for social movement news in the early 2000s, but in Los Angeles the large crowds were also mobilized by Spanish-language commercial radio and television stations that embraced the call to oppose H.R. 4437.
“THE MAY DAY MARCHES; Cities’ Immigrants Spoke One Language This Time; Rallies Attract More than a Million People of Varied Nationalities across the U.S. The Effect of the Economic Boycott Remains Unclear.: [HOME EDITION] - Los Angeles Times - ProQuest.” Accessed January 31, 2020. https://search.proquest.com/latimes/docview/422125282/B0609268A41C4AB7PQ/12?accountid=14512.
For 14 months during 2004-2005, UNITE HERE Local 11 mounted an assertive campaign to win a contract with employers represented by the Los Angeles Hotel Employers Council. Building on the union’s rank-and-file strategy, hotel workers organized repeated delegations to articulate their demands to hotel management. The union also mobilized community allies and the labor movement in boycotts and public demonstrations. In addition to wage and benefit demands, the union called for a contract that would expire in the fall of 2006, bringing Los Angeles into alignment with other major cities in the U.S. and Canada. According to Local 11 secretary-treasurer Tom Walsh, “having common contract expirations gives us the opportunity to speak to the same companies that operate all across the country at the same time as other unions are negotiating.” An agreement between the union and employers was brokered by mayor-elect Antonio Villaraigosa shortly before employers were set to lock out 2,500 workers. This short film produced for Local 11 features interviews with union members and leaders as well as scenes from delegations and demonstrations during 2004-05.
O’Dell, John. “Union, Hotels Avert Strike, Lockout; In Two Late City Hall Sessions, Villaraigosa Acts as Go-between to Achieve a Tentative Pact. Both Sides Anticipate Ratification This Week.: [HOME EDITION].” Los Angeles Times; Los Angeles, Calif., June 12, 2005, sec. California Metro; Part B; Metro Desk. http://search.proquest.com/latimes/docview/421968319/abstract/69804A1C4A44492FPQ/21.
In 2004, voters in the city of Inglewood rejected a ballot initiative that would have allowed retail giant WalMart to bypass the opposition of the city council to their big-box store. This documentary, narrated by a local minister, describes the unprecedented labor-community coalition that defeated the world’s largest corporation.
The Working Poor: Challenge to the Religious Community
What is the responsibility of people of faith when confronted with the poverty of working people in a wealthy country? That question is posed by Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice (CLUE) in this 2000 video featuring the testimony of working people, faith leaders, academics, and activists. Speakers include Kent Wong, Maria Elena Durazo, Madeline Janis-Aparicio, Richard Gillett, Anthony Thigpen, and others. The film concludes with a message from Rev. James M. Lawson, Jr.: “When we allow millions and millions of people in this country to work for nothing, we deprive them of their basic dignity, we commit mayhem against them. Jesus of Nazareth said, ‘The laborer deserves his wages.’ The church cannot be the church unless we get into the marketplace and insist that work is dignity, and that every employee, every worker deserves those benefits that enables them to indeed attain an abundant life that is full of the riches spiritual as well as the riches of bread.” (En Español)
Watanabe, Teresa. “A Union of Faith and Labor: As a Booming Economy Leaves Some of Its Workers Far behind, an Interfaith Convocation Reminds Members of the Clergy about Scriptural Commands to Help the Needy.” Los Angeles Times (1996-Current), July 22, 2000. https://www.proquest.com/hnplatimes/docview/2109770274/abstract/92000F9ACB5A47D3PQ/27.
The Los Angeles Living Wage Coalition explains the fight to extend the city’s living wage ordinance to workers at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). This 1998 production features interviews with Madeline Janis-Aparicio (LAANE) and Jackie Goldberg (L.A. City Counsel) as well as scenes of Mike Garcia leading a protest by SEIU Local 1877 at LAX. Rank-and-file workers explain the struggle of living in L.A. while earning low wages.
Cedillo, Gilbert. “All Should Feel Pain of Reform; Welfare: Business Must Pay Living Wages and Provide Health Benefits for All Workers.: [Home Edition].” Los Angeles Times (Pre-1997 Fulltext); Los Angeles, Calif., August 19, 1996, sec. Metro; PART-B; Op Ed Desk. http://search.proquest.com/latimes/docview/293362291/abstract/E3F4F4E3BCAF413CPQ/1.
Cardenas, Jose. “She’s Working Overtime for L.A.’s Living Wage Battle; Success Made Madeline Janis-Aparicio Labor’s Alter Ego. But Can She Do It Again in Santa Monica?: [Home Edition].” Los Angeles Times; Los Angeles, Calif., August 21, 2000, sec. Southern California Living; PART- E; PART-; View Desk. http://search.proquest.com/latimes/docview/421550115/abstract/1B2E1DCAC8744E85PQ/2.
As leader of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, Miguel Contreras (1952-2005) reshaped LA’s unions into a powerful political, economic, and social force. The child of farm workers, Contreras was an organizer for the United Farm Workers union (UFW), and later the Hotel and Restaurant Employees union (HERE). He led the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor from 1996 until is death in 2005. The LA Alliance for a New Economy produced this video documenting Contreras’s life story and his impact on the city’s labor movement and working people.
Milkman, Ruth, Kent Wong, and Miguel Contreras. “L.A. Confidential: An Interview with Miguel Contreras.” New Labor Forum, no. 10 (2002): 52–61. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40342341.
This video produced by the LA Alliance for a New Economy documents elements of the Living Wage campaign in Los Angeles. An actor dressed as the ghost of Jacob Marley from Charles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” haunts Los Angeles city hall warning the mayor and council members to consider the needs of low wage workers in December 1996. The council passed the ordinance covering workers for city contractors, and later voted to override the veto of Mayor Richard Riordan in April 1997.
WRITER, JEAN MERL TIMES STAFF. “L.A. Council OKs ‘Living Wage’ Law for City Contracts: Labor: With Enough Votes to Override Promised Riordan Veto, Panel Approves Minimum Pay for Lowest-Level Workers.” Los Angeles Times (1996-Current); Los Angeles, Calif, March 19, 1997, sec. Orange County. https://search.proquest.com/hnplatimes/docview/2109359639/abstract/17BA1ABB1F7142F2PQ/101.
After a majority of workers at the New Otani Hotel in downtown Los Angeles supported unionization, hotel management refused to negotiate. Members of HERE Local 11 from other Los Angeles hotels pledged to support the New Otani workers with weekly demonstrations that escalated into long-lasting boycott. This 1996 video produced by HERE Local 11 documents the union’s strategy of targeting the Kajima Corporation, a large Japanese construction firm that was the major stakeholders in the New Otani, which led to alliances with Japanese trade unionists and the Japanese-American community in Los Angeles. An example of “corporate campaigns” that many unions mounted in the 1980s, the boycott campaign focused on Kajima’s role in mid-century Japanese military expansion, the privatization of public services in Japan during the 1980s, and the public development subsidies Los Angeles had provided to Kajima and its partners. The film ends with scenes of a large act of nonviolent civil disobedience in the streets outside the hotel.
Olivo, Antonio. “Hotel Workers, Riot Police Clash During Protest; Demonstration: Union Decries Conditions at New Otani. LAPD Responds in a Show of Force That Some See as a Convention Preview.: [Home Edition].” Los Angeles Times; Los Angeles, Calif., August 4, 2000, sec. Metro; PART- B; PART-; Metro Desk. http://search.proquest.com/latimes/docview/421672605/abstract/5058E2A1E6C543DBPQ/17.
