Sheraton Crystal City Union Supporter Fired

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)

Doing its part to illustrate the need for the Employee Free Choice Act, the HEI Sheraton Crystal City Hotel has fired another worker who’s been an outspoken union supporter. According to UNITE HERE Local 25, the firing fits a pattern of HEI laying off or disciplining union activists at each hotel where workers have demanded justice. Originally suspended without pay on the first day of the organizing campaign in Northern Virginia, Lazo was called back to work after an outpouring of student and community solidarity. But on May 27, HEI fired Lazo, who has been an outspoken leader of the campaign for workplace justice, leading delegations to management, marching on picket lines and traveling to speak with students at universities invested in HEI, whose workers across the country are campaigning for a fair card check neutrality process to decide whether or not to form a union. Supporters have launched an online campaign to pressure HEI to sign a card check neutrality agreement and reinstate Lazo. The Employee Free Choice Act would strengthen penalties against companies illegally coercing or intimidating employees. - photo: Elizabeth Medina (l) and Ferdi Lazo (r) speak out at a Community Commission on Worker Justice, April 2009; photo by Joyce Putnam