Long Beach March Marks Launch of “Hope for Housekeepers” National Tour

Nearly 350 hotel housekeepers joined clergy and community leaders at a march and rally in Downtown Long Beach on September 30 to raise public awareness of the high risk of injuries for room attendants in Long Beach’s booming hospitality industry and to bring attention to Hyatt's across-the-board firing of housekeepers in Boston.

The event marked the launch of the “Hope for Housekeepers” campaign, a national effort by Hyatt housekeepers to stop the abuse of women in the hotel industry and bring a message of hope to fellow Hyatt housekeepers and the thousands of women working as housekeepers across the globe. The event also was part of a LAANE-led effort to raise job standards in the Long Beach, where the tourism-dependent economy has contributed to high poverty rates and where hotel wages lag those in comparable submarkets.

“Sometimes, I have to clean up to 30 rooms in one shift,” said Celia Alvarez, who has worked as a housekeeper for the Hyatt Long Beach for 19 years. “I have to rush through our work just to finish that many rooms in 8 hours—lifting, tucking, pulling, over and over again.  Because of this intense motion, I am permanently injured in my lower back and shoulder and can no longer work.”

In a recent academic study of 50 hotels operated by the top five hotel companies, Hyatt had the highest reported rate of injury for housekeepers, with housekeepers often cleaning up to 30 hotel rooms a day in just eight hours. The authors also report that many forgo health insurance for their families because of the high cost.  

A LAANE study, published earlier this year, found that the city of Long Beach had subsidized the construction of the Hyatt Long Beach with an estimated $77 million.  “Long Beach residents deserve better than substandard jobs and backbreaking working conditions for hotel workers in exchange for their considerable investment,” said Maria Loya, director of LAANE’s Responsible Hotels Project.

Hyatt housekeepers are organizing a seven-city tour, starting with Long Beach, featuring the symbol of their movement -- the Hope Quilt.  This quilt stitches together the stories of Hyatt housekeepers and the pain they endure everyday just to provide for their families. Each patch symbolizes a story of pain, injury, and even death or miscarriage brought about by the heavy burden of their workloads.  

"When our hotel guests see their rooms nice and clean, they have no idea that the housekeeper who did the work was probably injured," said Alvarez.  "Guests should know that we're suffering."

In Boston on August 31, Hyatt Hotels fired 100 long-term housekeepers and replaced them with low wage workers from a subcontractor.  The fired housekeepers claim they were told they were training the subcontracted workers as “vacation” replacements.  Hyatt workers and housekeepers across the nation held actions and vigils in support of the Boston Hyatt 100 Housekeepers.  Nearly 200 hospitality workers and community supporters were arrested last week as part of a non-violent civil disobedience action in downtown Chicago. The action, witnessed by over 600 workers and community supporters, took place in front of the Park Hyatt Hotel amid an escalating local labor dispute and a growing public backlash against Chicago-based Hyatt Hotels for the firings. Hotel workers in San Francisco also staged a major civil disobedience action in conjunction with the Chicago civil disobedience.

Since the Hope for Housekeepers campaign launched in Long Beach, the Hope Quilt has traveled to San Clemente, San Francisco, San Antonio and Indianapolis.  The final destination of the quilt will be the Hyatt headquarters in Chicago.  To date, the Hope Quilt stretches more than 125 feet long, and is continuing to grow.

To find out more about the Hope for Housekeepers campaign and to show your support by signing their pledge, please visit www.hotelworkersrising.org/hope.

Watch A Video On The March: