Culinary Union Back to Picketing Station Casinos’ Questionable Antics

The ongoing battle between the Culinary Union and Station Casinos continues. The casino operator has repeatedly refused to recognize legal attempts by workers to unionize. Its defiance has resulted in the courts getting involved. It still won’t budge and, after one of its properties reneged on a unionization agreement, Station finds itself in the spotlight once again.

Palace Station Walks Back Union Agreement

Friday night, a crowd protested outside Palace Station in Las Vegas over unfair labor practices by the casino’s parent company. The picket line was organized by the Culinary Union for hospitality workers. Palace workers had voted to unionize in 2016, and the property initially recognized the union.

However, workers claim it has backed out. Last year, the union asserted that the casino reneged on the deal and refused to recognize the union without putting the issue to a vote. That is against federal labor and unionization laws.

Station Casinos was also indicted by the federal court. A judge found that the casino operator had violated labor law when it provided new benefits to workers just before a union vote at Red Rock Casino 2019. In November, an appeals court upheld the ruling of the lower court.

Bethany Kahn, a spokeswoman for the Culinary Union, told local media outlet News 3 before the strike launched on Friday, “A picket is a public display of something that is not right in the property. Thousands of workers in nine different Station Casinos properties have stood up over the last decade and said, ‘We want a contract, we want to be treated with respect and dignity,’ and they deserve all of those things.”

Station Stays Silent

Station Casinos didn’t comment on the picket. However, News 3 received a copy of a flyer, which was distributed to discredit many of the Culinary Union’s arguments. The flyer states that workers at Palace Station and Boulder Station voted against unionization and accuses the union of “fighting job creation” by raising concerns over the Durango project.

The latter is a reference to Durango Station, Station’s new casino being built new the Las Vegas Strip. The Culinary Union called out Station, and its Red Rock Resorts parent company, over the project last September, citing concerns over the location of the project.

However, Station’s response to the Palace strike seems more like an attempt to deflect the real issue, which is recognizing the union’s legal position and workers’ elected involvement in the union.