West Hollywood Passes Legislation Increasing Safety for Resort Staff

Wednesday 11th August 2021

Last week the City of West Hollywood approved an extensive hotel worker protection ordinance. The regulation aims to protect the safety of hotel employees and improve their working conditions. The five core elements of the regulation are summarized below.

1. Personal security devices

Similar to an ordinance passed by Sacramento in 2020, West Hollywood, requires hotel employers to provide personal safety devices (such as panic buttons) to all hotel employees who work in guest rooms or restrooms where other hotel employees are absent. Hotel employers must also appoint a security guard, manager, or senior hotel officer to provide immediate on-site assistance in response to activation of a personal security device.

In addition, hotel employers must train their employees in the following areas:

• How to use and maintain personal safety devices

• The employer’s log for responding to device activation

• Rights of the hotel employee and obligations of the hotel employer

This training must be provided by the date this requirement becomes effective or within one month of the employee’s hiring date, whichever is later.

In addition, hotel employers must notify hotel employees in writing of their rights at the time they are hired or on the date this chapter comes into force, whichever occurs later. This communication must be in English, Spanish and any other language spoken by at least five percent of the hotel employees employed by the hotel employer.

A hotel employer must also post signs in at least 18-point type on the back of the front door of every guest room and toilet in a hotel with the following information: (1) A statement that “The law protects” hotel employees from threatening behavior “; (2) quote on this chapter of the West Hollywood Municipal Code; and (3) notifying guests that the hotel’s employer is providing personal safety devices to its employees.

Finally, the hotel’s employer must keep a record of personal security device activation incidents for three years from the incident.

This section will go into operation on January 1, 2022.

2. Compensation and workload

Employers at hotels with fewer than forty guest rooms are not allowed to clean rooms larger than 4,000 square feet in an eight-hour working day unless the hotel’s employer pays the housekeeper twice the normal salary of the housekeeping staff for each hour during the hour of the working day worked. The same applies to hotels with forty or more guest rooms, with the exception that staff are not allowed to clean rooms that are larger than 3,500 square feet.

If a room attendant is required to clean seven or more checkout rooms or additional bedrooms in an eight hour working day, each of those checkout rooms or additional bedrooms counts as 500 square feet for the purposes of this subsection, regardless of the actual square footage of each room. These restrictions apply to any combination of rooms, including guest rooms, meeting rooms and other rooms within the hotel, regardless of the furnishings, fittings or equipment of these rooms.

There are additional provisions regarding workload sharing, voluntary overtime and the keeping of records.

This section will go into operation on January 1, 2022.

3. Right of withdrawal

not how several local right of withdrawal ordinances issued since 2020 specifically related to COVID-19, this regulation is more comprehensive and applies to any hotel employee who is laid off.

A hotel employer must offer in writing to qualified dismissed hotel employees all positions for which the employee is qualified and which will become vacant after the regulation comes into force.

A hotel employee is qualified for a position if:

• The employee held the same or a similar position on the construction site at the time the employee was last dismissed; or

• The employee is or may be qualified for the position with the same training that would be offered to a newly recruited hotel employee for that position.

Hotel employers must comply with the requirements related to offers, including the order of preference, seniority, time of acceptance and rejection, and notification of non-selection and notification of rights. Hotel employers must keep the following records for at least three years:

• The full name of the employee, job classification, hiring date, last known postal address, telephone number and email address.

• A copy of the notice of dismissal for the employee.

This section will go into operation on September 1, 2021.

4. Employee retention

Changes to the hotel control trigger time-critical notification and retention obligations. Within five days of a change in control of a hotel, the subsequent employer must notify the change in the hotel concerned in writing.

Within fifteen days of a change of control, an incumbent hotel employer must provide the successor employer with a list of authorized hotel employees. Managerial, managerial or confidential employees have no right of retention under the ordinance.

During the retention period, the subsequent employer offers each authorized hotel employee employment for at least 90 days. Successor employers are not obliged to offer the employee employment if the employer has a justified and justified reason not to keep him due to the employee’s performance or behavior. The subsequent employer is also not obliged to keep employees if it discovers during the holding period that fewer employees are needed.

The ordinance stipulates that the subsequent employer provides the accepted employees with the same conditions as stipulated by the subsequent hotel employer, as stipulated by law, and may only be dismissed for good cause based on individual performance or behavior.

Retained hotel employees are employed under the same conditions as the previous employee and the subsequent employer must comply with other conditions with regard to the offer, performance evaluation and retention of records.

This section will go into operation on September 1, 2021.

5. Public housekeeping training

The ordinance requires West Hollywood to establish a certification and designation process for at least one government training organization. The hotel employer has to commission a contract with a certified public housekeeping company to conduct training courses and examinations for hotel employees at least once a year.

The training program includes:

• Rights of the hotel employee and obligations of the hotel employer.

• Best practices for identifying and responding to suspected cases of human trafficking, domestic violence, or violent or threatening behavior.

• Best practices for effective cleaning techniques to prevent the spread of disease.

• Best practices for identifying and preventing insect or vermin infestation.

• Best practices for identifying and responding to the presence of other potential criminal activity.

This section comes into force on July 1, 2022.

The regulation provides for limited waivers and exemptions, as well as civil remedies for non-compliance.

© 2021National Law Review, Volume XI, Number 223