A big group of Dodgers followers enthusiastically answered the decision throughout an August house sport towards the Arizona Diamondbacks. It was the workforce’s eighth annual Union Night time celebration, and whereas cheering for the Dodgers, followers additionally chanted for his or her native.
“Who’re we?” a leather-lunged fan shouted.
“Teamsters!” got here the reply.
The Dodgers’ advertising and marketing technique aimed toward blue-collar followers of the boys in blue isn’t hypocritical. The franchise reached two landmark Collective Bargaining Agreements in 2023 with the Service Staff Worldwide Union United Service Employees West (SEIU-USWW).
Though raises to the 450 staff that included ushers, safety officers and groundskeepers had been acknowledged as lengthy overdue and took organized protests and the specter of a strike for the Dodgers to comply with a contract, the outcome was a decisive victory for union solidarity.
Extra just lately the franchise hasn’t stood in the best way of one other phase of staff trying to unionize. It has hammered out an settlement with the Worldwide Alliance of Theatrical Stage Staff (IATSE) representing the 55 or so Dodger Stadium tour guides — principally part-timers whose information of Dodgers historical past and love of the workforce is unsurpassed.
But ratifying the settlement has confirmed troublesome as a result of roughly half of the guides don’t wish to unionize. A vote in October didn’t move by a 25-24 margin with six guides abstaining. Repeated emails by The Instances to a number of tour guides who voted towards unionizing weren’t answered, and the Dodgers declined to remark for this story.
The guides supporting the settlement have launched a re-vote for Dec. 15-17, and each side have spent latest weeks busily lobbying guides perceived as uncommitted. The divide has impacted morale, tour guides say, at a time when Dodger Stadium excursions have by no means been extra well-liked, described by the Dodgers throughout union negotiations as a “strong money-making operation.”
“The demand has risen tremendously the final two years,” tour information Cary Ginell stated. “It’s been nice for the Dodgers. After I joined in March 2022, the price of a tour was $25. Now no tour is lower than $42.50. The workforce is raking within the cash and none of it goes to us.”
Even when the union settlement is authorized, nevertheless, the battle gained’t be over as a result of guides opposing the union have already filed a decertification petition with the Nationwide Labor Relations Board to maintain IATSE from representing the tour guides.
Though each side accuse the opposite of underhanded techniques in swaying voters, the important thing difficulty dividing the group is pretty simple.
The brand new settlement would enhance wages by 25% from $17.87 to $24 an hour — roughly the identical fee the 2023 settlement did for the SEIU-USWW members — with further $1 an hour will increase within the second and third years of the contract.
Safety measures at stadium entry factors additionally could be improved. Tour guides have complained that followers who present up for excursions are capable of stroll into the stadium high deck with out passing via safety, generally even whereas carrying backpacks.
That lapse would finish, in response to a draft of the CBA obtained by The Instances: “The Employer shall present and correctly workers safety checkpoints that embrace a steel detector and bag search in any respect designated factors of entry for patrons getting into Dodger Stadium for functions of taking part in stadium excursions.”
Unionizing, nevertheless, would possibly halt the Dodgers’ longtime apply of giving tour guides 4 reserve-level tickets for every of the 13 homestands in a season, a perk value an estimated $2,600 assuming the tickets are valued at $50 every. The prospect of that could be a deal-breaker for most of the guides.
Tour guides current throughout negotiations stated the Dodgers refused to say free tickets within the union contract as a result of they stated different part-time union staff then would demand the identical perk. The Dodgers made it clear they weren’t essentially ending the perk, simply that the difficulty couldn’t be addressed within the settlement.
The financial worth of the tickets is larger than the increase for tour guides that work near the minimal variety of 60 four-hour shifts per 12 months. Nonetheless, the common tour information works about 125 shifts — 500 hours — a 12 months, and they’d be taking house extra pay in raises than the tickets are value.
Some less-experienced tour guides have felt strain from anti-union veteran guides. Semaj Perry stated that in his coaching in March, an older, revered information satisfied him to signal a decertification petition. Perry has since attended a negotiation session and browse the settlement between the Dodgers and the union.
“It’s extra of a standing factor than a monetary determination for among the older tour guides,” Perry stated. “For a few of them, that is enjoyable to do throughout retirement. I took the job as a result of I wanted to pay hire. I’m voting sure to hitch the union.”
Dodger Stadium excursions have turn out to be more and more well-liked — producing greater than $1 million a 12 months in income — due to latest stadium renovations, two consecutive World Collection championships and the signings of Japanese stars Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki.
“The tour program has grown a lot within the age of Ohtani,” stated Ray Lokar, a veteran Dodgers tour information whose full-time profession was a highschool coach and athletic director for practically 40 years. “The visibility and safety tasks have been amplified. It’s grown from a mother‐and‐pop operation of a dozen individuals exhibiting of us across the stadium to a multi-million greenback asset.”
The stadium excursions now fall beneath the administration umbrella of a just lately carried out revenue-producing initiative known as Dodgers 365, which affords year-round leases of every part from $50,000 for the sphere to $15,000 for the Centerfield Plaza to $12,500 for the Stadium Membership. In September, the LA Card Present made its Dodger Stadium debut, drawing 1000’s of followers swapping and bartering buying and selling playing cards.
Whereas recognizing that probably giving up free tickets is a stumbling block, a number of veteran tour guides who advocate becoming a member of the union are perplexed that so lots of their colleagues are suspicious of organized labor. About all they agree on is that they love the Dodgers.
“The tour workforce amplifies probably the most useful asset the Dodgers have: their model, the 135 years of historical past, from the borough of Brooklyn to Dodger Stadium,” Ginell, creator of 14 books on American music, stated. “It’s a unique operate than some other worker. We make followers comfortable conveying that historical past, and it’s that historical past that acquired the Dodgers their $2 billion price ticket.”
Lokar emphasised equity as a motive tour guides ought to vote to approve union illustration.
“We must be protected, revered and related,” he stated. “We wish to really feel protected bodily and emotionally, be paid pretty, and never handled as second-class residents.”
