PHILADELPHIA, January 13, 2023 – Dozens of Black, Brown, and immigrant Philadelphia International Airport food service workers, who are members of UNITE HERE Philly Local 274, picketed and rallied at PHL Terminal B Departures on Friday, January 13. They are protesting their employer’s refusal to sign the contract they agreed to 7 months ago, with free healthcare for over 95% of the workforce and holiday pay for Martin Luther King Day and other holidays for all workers. Workers chanted with bullhorns and noisemakers, holding signs that said, “Health Care is a Human Right!” and “OTG Unfair,” and distributed leaflets to curious airline passengers. They were joined in solidarity by other union members, community supporters, clergy, and political allies, including Councilmember Kenyatta Johnson, Senator Nikil Saval, and Councilmember Isaiah Thomas.
“This weekend, we celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He not only fought for civil rights, but he also fought for economic rights,” said Councilperson Kenyatta Johnson. “The Philadelphia International Airport is the people’s airport. Healthcare rights are human rights. As the chairperson for Transportation and as the councilperson who represents the Philadelphia International Airport, I will stand with you until we win this fight.”
On June 15, 2022, after four years of bargaining, OTG finally agreed with UNITE HERE Local 274 members for a new union contract with significant job improvements, such as wage increases, retro pay, free healthcare, paid time off, and holiday pays for tipped workers.
OTG runs all the food service in Terminal B, Terminal F’s Local Tavern, and Terminal C’s Sky Asian and is the largest food service operator at the airport, employing 235 bartenders, cooks, cashiers, dishwashers, restaurant servers, and support staff. OTG workers overwhelmingly voted YES for that agreement on June 22, 2022. As of today, OTG has failed to sign that agreement and on December 8, 2022, claimed that they do not have a collective bargaining agreement with their workers. They have failed to put in place the many improvements that workers had negotiated, agreed to, and voted for.
“It’s pretty incredible for a company to go through negotiations like this, and upper management to encourage us to ratify the agreement we had in June, and then take it back 6-months later,” said Michael Lagansky, a server at Local Tavern in Terminal F. “I was in those bargaining sessions. We need to enforce the agreement that we made.”
Workers are asking the community to tell OTG to stand by their agreements and sign our contract so all full-time workers can have free healthcare and all workers can receive full holiday pay for Martin Luther King Day and other annual holidays.
UNITE HERE Philly Local 274 is the union that welcomes you to Philadelphia, representing 4,000 private sector hotel and food service workers who work at the stadiums, airports, and hotels throughout the Philadelphia region. We serve the food, hold the door, carry the bags, clean the rooms, and wash the laundry. We’re fighting to make sure Black, Brown, and immigrant workers aren’t left out of Philadelphia’s economy.
