U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley threw her support on Saturday behind 52 workers who said they were terminated from Boston’s Nine Zero Hotel, calling their firings an “unconscionable” “betrayal” just as the city is reopening.
“I’m in this fight with you,” said Pressley, D-Mass., a former hotel worker herself who joined them as they stood across the street from the hotel, holding a banner that read, “Nine Zero Hotel: Don’t Fire Us.”
“This is not how you repay people who have been so faithful, so loyal,” Pressley said. “It is a betrayal not only of these workers, but of their families as well in the middle of a pandemic … It is unconscionable … It is cruel and unjust.”
The workers — all members of UNITE HERE Local 26, who were laid off in March 2020 — recently received letters terminating them, even though their contract says they can only be fired for “just cause,” such as lateness or stealing, union representatives said.
Isaias Liros, a 56-year-old father of three from Lynn, said he spent 15 of his 30 years as a cook at the Nine Zero.
“This is all I know how to do,” Liros said. “What kind of life am I going to have? I don’t know what I’m going to do after unemployment runs out.”
A Nine Zero representative did not return calls seeking comment.
To date, the union said, 30 Boston hotels have agreed to recall their laid-off workers with seniority once business returns, and 28, including the Nine Zero, have not.
Two weeks ago, about one-third of some 230 Marriott Copley Place workers who also were fired picketed outside the hotel.
With more than 8,000 union and nonunion Boston hotel workers unemployed, members of Local 26 are working with state Sen. Joe Boncore and Rep. Marjorie Decker to pass legislation to allow workers back to their jobs if and when the positions return, union president Carlos Aramayo said.
Under the bill, an employer would be required to offer any position that becomes available to a qualified laid-off worker who held the same or a similar position at the hotel or who could become qualified for the position through the same training that would be provided to a new worker hired for the same position.
Workers not given that opportunity could seek damages in Superior Court within three years. If the court sides with the laid-off worker, the court could order hiring of the worker, with or without back pay, and award him or her lost pay and benefits, or $1,000 in damages — whichever is greater. The court could also award punitive damages.
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