Tropicana dealers vote to drop TWU

By Liz Benston

Tuesday, July 16, 2002 | 11:13 a.m.

Dealers at the Tropicana Resort & Casino in Las Vegas voted overwhelmingly Saturday to drop the Transport Workers Union of America, reversing a vote to adopt union representation in January 2001.

Of 147 dealers eligible to vote, 98 voted to decertify the union and 38 voted against decertification.

The vote marks the latest blow to the Transport Workers Union, a group that is relatively new to Las Vegas. Workers at eight casinos have rejected union representation since the TWU began a local organizing campaign more than a year ago.

In April, dealers at the Stratosphere hotel-casino voted 112-105 to decertify the union.

Kicking out a union before it has even had a chance to negotiate a labor contract is "unheard of," TWU organizer Frank Trotti said Monday.

"This has never happened to us before. I have no idea what the reason is," he said.

Dealers are dissatisfied with the way the union handled layoffs after Sept. 11, and, more recently, with a union contract signed at the New Frontier casino in Las Vegas, said two Tropicana dealers who declined to be named.

After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, management offered dealers the option of layoffs by seniority or laying off people with some discipline problems, the dealers said. Union representatives chose the latter, which angered dealers who viewed seniority as paramount. Dealers also feared a contract similar to that signed at the New Frontier, considered "the worst contract ever signed by anybody in labor," one dealer said.

The TWU reached its first collective bargaining agreement with the New Frontier casino, the union's only foothold in Las Vegas, a few months ago.

At the Tropicana, the TWU was in the process of negotiating the first-ever pension plan for Las Vegas dealers -- who have relatively low participation rates in standard 401(k) plans, Trotti said.

The New Frontier contract, which froze wages for dealers, marked the city's first contract for casino dealers and was considered a starting point for future negotiation, he added.

Representatives at the Tropicana hotel-casino could not be reached for comment.

Tropicana dealer Anne Brown filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board in May to decertify the union. Workers will have seven days after Saturday's vote to file objections on how the process was handled, said Michael Chavez, the NLRB's resident officer in Las Vegas.

The TWU has filed an appeal with the NLRB over the Stratosphere vote. A hearing on the matter is scheduled for Sept. 24. The union won't appeal the Tropicana decision, Trotti said.

The union is actively recruiting at other Las Vegas casinos, he said. He declined to name the properties.

An agreement reached with another AFL-CIO-affiliated union, the Teamsters, determined that the TWU had exclusive jurisdiction over organizing casino dealers in Las Vegas.