Atlantic City Braces For Potential Casino Strike
by David Madden
ATLANTIC CITY, NJ (CBS) -- Members of Local 54 UNITE HERE are preparing for a potential strike at up to 5 Atlantic City casinos, just in time for the holiday weekend.
Over 6 thousand hospitality workers at the Trump Taj Mahal, Tropicana, Caesar's, Bally's and Harrah's could be walking picket lines Friday. Strike captains got their marching orders at union headquarters. Among them, Jason McKnight, a 9 year bartender at Harrah's.
"If we're struggling, then the pizza shop down the street is struggling as much as we are.," McKnight told KYW Newsradio. "So at the end of the day, we just feel that it is important we show the company that we're not going to continue to be treated the way that we are being treated."
They're looking for their first wage increase in several years. They'd like 60 cents an hour each year for 5 years, and improvements in health care and pensions. They're also seeking a return of givebacks made several years ago that have cost the average worker 15 hundred dollars a year.
"The workers are looking for a restoration of those benefits and a fair wage increase," said Ben Begleiter, a spokesman for Local 54. "Since 2012, the workers with the most seniority had only 80 cents in wage increases."
At the Taj, they'd like to seek those perks restored, after a bankruptcy judge stripped them from their last contract. Failure to achieve that could cause a ripple effect through the rest of the casino industry down the shore.
