Workers Deliver Petition to Station Casinos about Health and Safety Risks, says UNITE HERE

LAS VEGAS, Feb. 15, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Workers recently presented Station Casinos' management with a petition signed by one hundred occupational health professionals calling on the company to assure full compliance with its responsibility to protect its workers from health and safety risks.

Station Casinos is partially owned by Red Rock Resorts.

"We have been understaffed for the last six to seven years and they don't train people properly. The pots and pans are regularly dirty so I have to work extra hard to clean everything before I can cook, which adds a lot of stress to my job," said Adolfo Gaspar, a Palace Station cook.

"We just had a health and safety training. The management rushed us through it, said we didn't have to watch the video, and they even gave us the answers," said Viola Butler, a Palace Station hostess-cashier.

The petition is an outcome of a blind academic study, commissioned by the Culinary Union, on the health and safety of non-union casino workers in Las Vegas that was conducted in 2015 and presented at the American Public Health Association's 2016 conference. The Culinary Union has since identified the employer subject of the blind study as Station Casinos. The report was written by Diana Romero, PhD, of the City University of New York's (CUNY's) Graduate School of Public Health, and Kathleen Flandrick, MPH.

"The findings from this study are very clear. Unfortunately, workers across all job classifications – from guest room attendants and porters to kitchen and front-of-house staff – described being exposed to unsafe and unhealthful working conditions," said report author Dr. Diana Romero.

This latest study comes on the heels of an independent human rights report authored by three legal scholars that raised allegations of human rights abuses at Station Casinos' properties.

The findings from the health and safety study exposed a lack of proper supplies, faulty equipment, issues surrounding breaks and meal periods, understaffing, lack of training, perceived discrimination, and exposures that negatively affect the health of employees.

ABOUT THE CULINARY UNION:
Culinary Workers Local 226 and Bartenders Local 165, Nevada affiliates of UNITE HERE, represent over 57,000 workers in Las Vegas and Reno, including at most casino resorts on the Las Vegas Strip and in Downtown Las Vegas. UNITE HERE represents 270,000 hospitality workers in gaming, hotel, and food service industries in North America.

CulinaryUnion226.org / @Culinary226

SOURCE UNITE HERE