Gov. Lamont, stand with working mothers: Pass striking workers bill for a stronger Connecticut

By Carla Vallati

Room attendant at the Omni New Haven Hotel and Local 217 Unite Here shop steward

I love my job. I do everything for the guests, and you would think I would be the last person to want to go on strike. But that’s how bad it got last year during our contract negotiations at the Omni New Haven Hotel at Yale.

Last September, my coworkers and I went on strike, and with our victory we created a new standard for hospitality jobs in New Haven. Unions and victories like ours are the most effective way to expand the middle class in Connecticut. In a moment of historic inequality and a growing sense that so much is rigged for the ultra-wealthy, elected leaders must do much more to support working people. Even as the federal government executes an assault on working people and our rights, Gov. Ned Lamont has the power to ensure that working people have economic security. One vital step that he and Connecticut’s General Assembly must take this legislative session is passing the striking workers bill.

Our struggle shows how strikes can expand the middle class by securing fair deals from billionaires. The Omni was refusing to give us raises that keep up with the cost of living in New Haven. My parents lived in New Haven, I live in New Haven, and now my kids and grandkids live in New Haven. Like most working people who live here, I worry about being priced out of the city. For me, winning a living wage means having the freedom to stay close to my family and community.

My coworkers showed significant courage by going out on strike, but it was terrifying for all of us. Yes, we wanted to fight for what we deserve, but we all had bills to pay. We were all thinking in the back of our minds: how long can we afford this? It’s not fair that working people take such a loss just because we want to fight for our rights, while our employer can sit back with $5 billion in wealth.

Thanks to my new contract, I can help buy things for my new grandbaby’s baby shower. I can start putting a little bit away into savings. But what if we had to go out for a long time? The striking workers bill would have protected me and my coworkers from debt and evictions. It also would have encouraged the Omni to stay at the table and avoid a strike altogether. No one decides to go on strike lightly – no employer should force workers out on strike lightly, either.

All over New Haven, hotel workers are organizing to make our jobs better. My daughter Julia was a bartender at the Old Heidelberg bar during the Graduate Hotel’s union drive, and after they won their union, other hotels raised their wages, too. My other daughter, Charlé, got a job as a housekeeper at the Cambria Hotel. She signed many of her coworkers on union cards, and they won a union there, too. 

New union drives like the ones my daughters organized could become next to impossible in a Trump administration. The federal government is taking aim at the National Labor Relations Board, a 90-year-old agency protecting workers' rights to organize and bargain collectively. Contract negotiations will become more unequal if the NLRB puts fewer restraints on billionaire companies who want to destroy their unions. And we are all facing the threat of a recession. In the face of all these threats, the striking workers bill is the best thing our state can do to protect workers if we need to exercise one of our most basic labor rights: the right to strike.

The striking workers bill makes the choice clear for Governor Lamont: he can stand up for working people and expand the middle class or he can go along with the billionaire attacks on the rest of us. 

Governor Lamont said on the picket line that hotel workers like me “took some real hits during COVID just like the hotels did. They flattened their wages, now give them a chance to catch up.” We caught up, thanks to our strong union. Now he and the General Assembly must pass the striking workers bill to help other workers catch up, too.