Workers at the Fiesta Henderson Hotel and Casino just outside Las Vegas have voted to join the Southern Nevada locals of the Culinary and Bartenders unions.
The Fiesta is the seventh Southern Nevada property operated by Station Casinos to vote to join the unions, which represent some 60,000 hospitality workers in Las Vegas and Reno, most of them in the gaming industry, as affiliates of the national labor organization UNITE HERE.
The Fiesta’s initial union vote was held in June under the auspices of the National Labor Relations Board, which is battling Station in court over the company’s refusal to recognize any of the elections or join in contract negotiations with the unions.
The others are Boulder Station, Palace Station and the Palms in Las Vegas, Fiesta Rancho in North Las Vegas and Sunset Station and Green Valley Ranch in Henderson.
Station a subsidiary of publicly traded Red Rock Resorts, which is controlled by billionaire brothers Frank Fertitta III and Lorenzo Fertitta.
In May, the NLRB cited management at the Palms for refusing to recognize the unions or bargain with them and ruled that Station was “engaged in unfair labor practices.”
Station is contesting the ruling in a case slated to be argued before the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
In the meantime, the Culinary and Bartenders locals along with members of UNITE HERE have picketed the Palms on more than one occasion in a battle that has drawn the attention of Democrats in Congress and several of the party’s 2020 presidential hopefuls, Bernie Sanders, Julian Castro and Pete Buttigieg among them.
