Union leaders from TWU, the United Auto Workers (UAW), the Service Employees (SEIU) and the AFL-CIO this month announced formation of a Gaming Workers Council to expand current organizing efforts for table game dealers and to achieve first contracts for properties already organized.

The announcement took place at a press conference at the UAW hall in Atlantic City.  AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, TWU Executive Vice President Harry Lombardo, SEIU International President Andy Stern and UAW Secretary Treasurer Elizabeth Bunn represented their respective organizations at the event.

AFL-CIO President Sweeney said that the new coalition will add power to gaming workers “who are courageously pursuing their dreams.  We will be stepping up our efforts to ensure that these gaming workers receive the contract they deserve—and they shouldn’t have to wait another day.”

TWU’s Lombardo added:  “The casinos we are dealing with were once Nevada-only businesses but today are national and multinational in their reach. If we are to best represent workers in the gaming industry, unions need to take a national, and perhaps global, approach and that is exactly what we are doing today.”

"This is about workers," said UAW Secretary-Treasurer Elizabeth Bunn.  "It’s about workers who have had their hours reduced, who are paying more for health care, who have lost their seniority rights, and who have been shut out at the bargaining table by casino executives who make millions of dollars a year." "Let there be no misunderstanding.  We stand side by side with the women and men who have formed their own unions to ensure the gaming industry hears their voices and does right by them," said SEIU President Andy Stern. "We hope the power of persuasion will bring the casinos to the bargaining table, but if it takes the persuasion of power to bring these workers justice, we will be by their side."

In addition to new organizing drives, the council will assist in bargaining efforts on behalf of casino workers in Atlantic City, Las Vegas, Indiana, Connecticut and elsewhere who have voted to form their own unions and are fighting to win first contracts. The council members also plan to reach out to hundreds of thousands of unorganized casino workers and communicate about working conditions in the gaming industry to union members, the public, elected officials, casino regulators and investors.

TWU won drives at Caesars Palace and Wynn Las Vegas in the past year, but management at both properties is stonewalling collective bargaining efforts. The UAW has had similar organizing successes in Atlantic City at the Tropicana, Trump Plaza and Bally’s with similar problems at the table.