LAS VEGAS – Las Vegas hotel workers voted overwhelmingly Monday to approve their contract agreement with casino giant Caesars Entertainment, signalling an end to a protracted labour dispute that had brought the threat of a historic strike to the Strip.
The Culinary Workers Union announced on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, that 99% of the vote was in favour of the new five-year contract.
“BEST CONTRACT EVER! Congratulations to 10,000 hospitality workers!” the post read.
The union is also expected to approve its proposed contracts with Wynn Resorts and MGM Resorts International, the Strip’s largest employer, later this week.
The breakthrough deals were tentatively reached earlier this month, just hours before the union threatened a massive walkout at 18 Strip hotel-casinos, including the Bellagio, Paris Las Vegas, MGM Grand and Caesars Palace.
In a statement, Ted Pappageorge, the union’s chief negotiator, said workers had been willing to take a pay cut if the union had gone on strike. He said they had sacrificed their leisure time during seven months of negotiations to help secure historic pay increases and other important victories, including a reduction in housekeeping workload and improved job security amid advances in technology.
“Nothing was promised or guaranteed, and thousands of workers who participated in rallies, protests, civil disobedience, picketing, polling, picket sign making, strike votes and delegations at the properties sacrificed to win a better future for themselves and our families,” said Pappageorge, himself a former unionized hotel worker who went on strike with 500 other workers at the now-shuttered New Frontier Hotel and Casino in downtown Las Vegas in 1991.
It became one of the longest strikes in US history, lasting more than six years. The union said all strikers returned to work with back pay and benefits.
Now, Pappageorge said the union has won a 32% wage increase for its members over five years, with workers getting a 10% raise in the first year of their new contract. He said this would total about $2 billion from the casino companies by the end of the contract.
The contracts cover more than 35,000 workers at properties along the Strip owned or operated by Caesars, MGM Resorts and Wynn Resorts.
By the end of the contract, Pappageorge said, union workers will earn an average of $35 an hour, including benefits. Union workers currently earn about $26 an hour with benefits.
In his statement, Pappageorge thanked the casino companies “for doing the right thing and investing in the frontline workers who make the entire industry work.
In separate statements released when the deals were reached, the companies said the contracts recognise union workers for their contribution to the companies’ success, with historic pay rises and opportunities for growth linked to plans to bring more union jobs to the Strip.
A strike by workers at all three companies would have been historic, both in scale and timing.
The union – the largest in Nevada, with about 60,000 members statewide – had threatened to strike less than a week before Formula One was due to open its new racetrack on the Strip.
Experts said the impact of tens of thousands of workers walking off the job would have been immediate: Reduced room cleaning. Dirty, unpolished floors. Neglected landscaping. Slow service in restaurants and bars. Long waits for valet parking. Limited room availability.
The Culinary Union’s strike threat came on top of a big year for unions that included Hollywood walkouts that brought the film and television industry to a historic halt, contentious UPS negotiations that threatened to disrupt the nation’s supply chain, and the ongoing strike by hotel workers at Detroit’s three casinos, including the MGM Grand Detroit.