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By Ben Cabral
Speaker from Solidarity Rally
BOSTON – After multiple waves of strikes by UNITE HERE Local 26 hotel workers across the city, the militant labor actions are starting to bear fruit.
On Sunday October 20th, workers at Omni Hotel properties in Boston voted unanimously to ratify their new contract. This brings to an end the open-ended strike by over 600 Omni Boston Seaport and Omni Parker House workers that began on Monday, October 14th.
According to a union rep, the newly ratified contract guarantees a $10/hour and $5/hour raise for non-tipped and tipped workers respectively over the next 4 years, maintains worker healthcare benefits, establishes Junteenth holiday for workers starting in 2026, and adds new hiring and severance protections, a package which addresses all of the workers’ core demands.
UNITE HERE Workers on the Picket Line
This is a clear victory for the Omni hotel workers that will no doubt serve as inspiration for other UNITE HERE labor struggles. The union built quickly on the good news and maintained its momentum, organizing a solidarity rally held on Friday, October 25th at Statler Park designed to pressure Hilton hotel properties to meet the demands of their workers as well.
The Teamsters truck made an appearance at the rally as a show of solidarity between the Teamsters Local 25 and UNITE HERE Local 26 workers.
Teamsters Local 25 truck provides support at UNITE HERE rally.
Multiple workers came up to the stage on the Teamsters truck to give powerful speeches about Local 26’s “one city, one standard” principle, meaning all Local 26 workers should have the same high standards in their contract across all hotel properties, and they called on Hilton to meet the standard set by the Omni workers.
This call was met quickly, with striking Hilton workers reaching a tentative agreement with Hilton on Tuesday October 29, and then voting to ratify their new contract on Thursday, October 31.
Speaker from the Statler Park Solidarity Rally
The contract met all of the union’s core demands and matched the standard set by the Omni workers’ contract, including a $10/hour raise over 4 years for non-tipped workers, maintaining healthcare benefits, and improving hiring and severance protections, all coming in the wake of a 24 day open ended strike by Hilton workers.
The contract victories, won through militant industrial action, are the latest example of the revival of a fighting spirit in the US labor movement, and show in dollars and cents to the workers of Boston what can be won through the power of unionization and labor action.
Ben is an engineer and a member of Boston DSA with a background in independent journalism.
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