HEI Hotels and Resorts, owner of the Sheraton Crystal City, is one of the fastest growing hotel management companies in the US. While itowns a hotel, HEI employs a range of techniques to bring costs down.Employees have experienced reduced hours and layoffs, shortages in cleaning supplies and basic materials, and increased workloads -especially in housekeeping.

Now, HEI workers are fighting back! In February 2009, workers at the Sheraton Crystal City in Northern Virginia joined HEI workers at the Le Meridien in San Francisco and Hilton Long Beach in a national campaign for fairness. Supported by student activists and local community leaders, workers presented their general manager with a demand for a fair and democratic process for deciding whether to form a union, without management interference.

In October and November, the Office General Counsel of the NLRB issued unfair labor practice complaints against the HEI Sheraton Crystal City. The complaints allege that HEI engaged in violations of federal labor, including allegedly: interrogating employees about union activity, creating the impression of surveillance by questioning employees about their presence at pro-union events, threatening employees with reprisals because of union activity, threatening employees with losing their employment if they continued to participate in union activity, coercing employees by confiscating union materials, coercing employees by implying that they were disloyal to their employer because they engaged in union activity and informing employees that it would be futile for them to select a union as their bargaining representative by implying they would not get a pay raise. The complaints also contend that HEI allegedly suspended and then fired union leader Ferdi Lazo because of his role in the union and allegedly disciplined a front desk worker in retaliation for his union activity. HEI has denied these charges and will have to defend themselves in a hearing on January 20, 2010.