Support Needed for Hotel Strikers: We All Can Help

While we wait for the necessary general strike call from the San Francisco Central Labor Council that will guarantee a union contract for the hotel strikers within 24 hours, every single one of us can do something to help the hotel strikers.

1. BRING FOOD AND BEVERAGE to the picketlines. Hot coffee, tea, hot chocolate, with the usual sugar, cream, etc. are much needed as these tall hotels create an icy condition on the hard cold ground where the strikers picket. Both hot food as well as sandwiches, donuts and bagels are needed too. Soda pop and water are also needed. Every picketline has a table where you can place the food and beverage. These picketlines are fully staffed at least from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., and many have a small picketline all night.

2. When you walk in the tourist areas, become a solo picketline, chanting "Check out of your scab hotel today; this is a union town!" You can clap, sing, dance to this to give it some class and help dramatize the cause.

3. When you drive past the hotel strikers, HONK YOUR HORN . This is a tremendous morale booster and helps the noise-making by the strikers, with the goal being to make it too noisy to stay at these scab hotels, at least near the ground level.

4. To all you Muni bus and cable car drivers: Honk your horn and ring that cable car bell loudly every time you pass the hotel strikers. This is also a morale booster in that it builds union solidarity across union lines.

5. Walk that picketline yourself. If you are a union member, wear your union jacket, pin or hat. Due to the anti-immigrant comments by white tourists I have heard made against the strikers, who are mostly immigrant, I urge all of you who are not immigrants to make a special effort to walk that picketline. The bosses certainly do not distinguish between immigrant and native or any color, gender, sexual orientation or level of education; we are all just workers maximizing the bosses' profits.

The picketlines are at :
(from http://www.hotellaboradvisor.info/hotelguidestrike.asp)
Argent Hotel (50 Third Street near Market)
Crowne Plaza Union Square (Sutter and Powell)
Fairmont Hotel (California and Mason)
Four Seasons (757 Market between 3rd and 4th Sts)
Grand Hyatt (345 Stockton at Sutter)
Hilton (333 O'Farrell at Mason)
Holiday Inn Civic Center (50 Eighth St at Market)
Holiday Inn Express at Fish Wharf (550 Northpoint)
Holiday Inn at Fish Wharf (1300 Columbus)
Hyatt Regency(Market at Embarcadero)
Mark Hopkins (California and Mason)
Omni San Francisco (500 California)
Sheraton Palace (Market and New Montgomery)
St. Francis (Powell and Geary)