Labor strife at the Andaz West Hollywood is exasperating management at the landmark Sunset Strip hotel.

Unite Here Local 11, a union for hospitality workers, staged two large demonstrations in the last two months at the Andaz, including one on Valentine’s Day, protesting alleged abuse of housekeepers by Hyatt Hotels Corp., which operates the West Hollywood hotel.

The union has been calling on customers and suppliers to boycott the Andaz and two other area Hyatt hotels. Andaz management and the union have failed to agree on a new contract since the old one expired in 2009 and wages are frozen as a result.

Philip Dailey, general manager at the Andaz, believes the union is exploiting the Sunset Strip hotel’s prominence by holding protests there and dragging out negotiations. That helps bring attention to the unionizing efforts elsewhere.

He said he’s tired of his employees being stuck with outdated wages because of a fight that has little to do with them.

“We’re frustrated because we want our associates to get all the wages and benefits that all the other Local 11 employees are getting,” Dailey said. “I suppose if they feel that they can keep on delaying signing the contract, that it gives them a bigger platform to discuss their national campaign of growing membership.”

On its website HyattHurts.org, Unite Here reports that it’s working to bring the union to Hyatt hotels in Long Beach; Santa Clara; San Francisco; Indianapolis; San Antonio; and Scottsdale, Ariz.

Leigh Shelton, a spokeswoman for Unite Here, said the union’s issues with Andaz are not about a national agenda.

“We have a big problem with Hyatt and how it treats its workers, housekeepers and otherwise,” Shelton said. “I don’t think the Andaz, quite frankly, is any different.”

The other hotels included in the boycott are the Hyatt Regency Long Beach, a nonunion hotel, and Century City’s Hyatt Regency Century Plaza, another union hotel. The union and management are in contract negotiations in Century City, too; workers there also have not had a raise in more than two years.

Historic site

The Andaz has been a union hotel for 45 years, since Chicago-based Hyatt Hotels first came into the picture in 1967. The property, opened on the Sunset Strip in 1963 as Gene Autry’s Hotel Continental, was renamed the Continental Hyatt House. In the ’70s, it was a place where rock stars were known to party and was called the Riot Hyatt: It’s said Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones once launched a TV set through a 10th-floor window.

The hotel has gone through various names and ownership changes over the years. In January 2009, it opened after renovations as the Andaz West Hollywood. The 239-room hotel employs 174 people, 124 of whom are members of Unite Here; the others are nonunion. The average employee has worked at the hotel for nine years. The longest-term employee, an in-room dining attendant, has been there four decades.

Dailey said 52 of the hotel’s union employees have stopped paying dues, and of those, 22 have resigned from the union while negotiations drag on.

“I think they’re slowly realizing that Unite Here is not looking after their best interest, which is wages and benefits,” he said.

Employees at the Andaz are still getting wages under the old contract, which expired in 2009. Dailey said that means employees are missing out on a couple of dollars an hour on average, depending on the job, pending adoption of a new contract.

Shelton of the union said the hotel could pay higher wages.

“If they want to pay them more, no one’s stopping them,” she said. “But we don’t believe in signing an agreement just to have an agreement. We’re about trying to make sure we have good jobs in this city in the hospitality industry and that workers are protected and safe. If we have to fight for several years to make sure workers get that, we’ll do it.”

An Andaz spokesman said housekeepers make an average of $14.60.

The hotel and union agree that it’s unusual for contract negotiations to go on so long. That’s because union contracts signed in the hospitality industry typically require renegotiation after three or four years.

Dailey said there are two clauses holding up negotiations. The first is what’s called “card-check neutrality.” That’s an agreement that requires an employer to recognize a union if a majority of workers signs authorization cards in support of the union, instead of holding an election as is traditionally done. Critics of card-check neutrality say the process is undemocratic, and that unions formed that way are sometimes a result of force or coercion on the part of pro-union activists.

The second is a strike clause. Dailey said Unite Here wants to make sure its members can strike, boycott or protest in solidarity with Hyatt workers at other hotels.

“That doesn’t make sense to us, because the whole point of a signed labor agreement is labor peace,” he said. “That’s a deal that no one would take.”

‘Tantamount to abuse’

Unite Here agrees the strike clause is one issue holding up contract negotiations, but it contends that overworking employees is a bigger problem.

In late February, the hotel settled a complaint the union brought before the National Labor Relations Board when the hotel tried to raise the number of rooms housekeepers were expected to clean each day without negotiating first. The complaint was settled in favor of the housekeepers.

Shelton said that the hotel’s raising of the workload for housekeepers last year without negotiating with the union is tantamount to abuse.

“There are some really big issues of abuse with the Hyatt nationally and with the Andaz locally,” she said. “Those are the things that are really holding up the contract settlement.”

Another problem the union sees with the local hotel is that it recently eliminated some union positions. The hotel developed a new model for its hotel lobby that doesn’t rely on front desk agents, bellmen or concierge services anymore. Rather, it relies on hosts who do many things, from checking guests into the hotel on an iPad, bringing them a glass of wine and carrying their bags to their rooms.

Shelton said eliminating hospitality jobs is a problem for more than just the union. It’s a problem for the L.A. economy, where the hospitality industry is a major economic driver.

“If the hospitality industry is supposed to be one of the top industries to help carry Los Angeles out of the recession, they need to bring people back to work,” she said. “They can’t be creating a deficit in jobs.”

But Dailey said that where the hotel is eliminating positions in one aspect of its operations, there are other areas where the hotel is bringing in more employees.

As a result of the settlement the hotel reached with Unite Here in February, the hotel might have to hire more housekeepers.

Dailey said the Andaz presented a contract to Unite Here last September that it called its “last, best, final offer,” but the union turned it down.

“It was the exact contract that all the other Local 11 hotels in Los Angeles have, with the caveat that we don’t agree to the card-check neutrality and strike clauses,” he said. “I don’t think any reasonable person would concur with that.”