Speaker 1: Hotel workers go into what are essentially people's bedrooms every
Speaker 1: day by themselves. How do we keep them safe? Today
Speaker 1: on Parts Pavilion, we talk about the new technology that
Speaker 1: may help to prevent sexual assault in the hospitality industry. Hello,
Speaker 1: and welcome once again to Parts per Billion, the policy
Speaker 1: podcast from Bloomberg Environment. I'm your host, David Schultz, and
Speaker 1: today we're going to go a little bit off of
Speaker 1: our typical beaten path and talk about an issue that's
Speaker 1: not quite on the environment beat. Our colleague Fatima Husaying
Speaker 1: covers occupational safety, and she just did a really fascinating
Speaker 1: story about a bill out in California that would require
Speaker 1: all hotels to give their workers panic buttons. The workers
Speaker 1: could press these buttons if they're feeling threatened by a
Speaker 1: guest and help would come immediately. The bill would also
Speaker 1: require hotels to maintain so called blacklists of guests who've
Speaker 1: threatened their workers in the past and deny service to
Speaker 1: anyone on these lists. We wanted these talk to Fatima
Speaker 1: about the rationale behind this bill and about its chances
Speaker 1: of moving forward in the California legislature. But first I
Speaker 1: asked her, how do these panic buttons work? So the
Speaker 1: panic buttons themselves are tiny electronics that are worn on
Speaker 1: the body, whether through a wristband or on a lanyard.
Speaker 1: It's silent, so you wouldn't hear the noise of an
Speaker 1: individual who is afraid of a guest in a room.
Speaker 1: You press the button and immediately somebody from management is
Speaker 1: summoned to the room and they can be there in
Speaker 1: a matter of minutes. An individual who runs one of
Speaker 1: these companies, the company was Pinpoint. They told me that
Speaker 1: the cost of these buttons for an entire hotel would
Speaker 1: roughly be around two hundred thousand dollars per hotel. So
Speaker 1: that's important to note because that's where we get that
Speaker 1: conflict in between the safety of workers and individuals who
Speaker 1: run hotels and the business groups. But we're not just
Speaker 1: talking about that's one aspect of the legislation. But the
Speaker 1: other aspect is that if a hotel worker I guess
Speaker 1: hits their panic button, the hotels also have to maintain
Speaker 1: a blacklist that would put that guest on the list
Speaker 1: and the guests could never stay there again. Right, And
Speaker 1: there are a lot of conversations about blacklists and hotels.
Speaker 1: They do exist already. If you are extremely belligerent and
Speaker 1: go to your local hotel. They likely have some type
Speaker 1: of list to remind themselves that you're not allowed to
Speaker 1: be there. But it sounds like this is different and
Speaker 1: that this would be the state requiring hotels to maintain
Speaker 1: this list, right, And that's where the California Chamber of
Speaker 1: Commerce and the California Hotel and Lodging Association say that
Speaker 1: there are constitutional issues there in terms of the government
Speaker 1: keeping lists like this. Well, we'll get into the arguments
Speaker 1: against this legislation in a little bit, but I actually
Speaker 1: I'm interested in finding out more about why hotel workers
Speaker 1: need this. I mean, I can take a few guesses,
Speaker 1: but why are they saying that this legislation is necessary.
Speaker 1: That's a really good question. Being a hotel worker, you
Speaker 1: face a lot of harassment and discrimination on the basis
Speaker 1: of working alone in very personal quarters of individuals who
Speaker 1: are kind of transient moving from one city to another.
Speaker 1: A study was done by unite here, which is a
Speaker 1: major labor union in the United States and Canada, that
Speaker 1: said that at least fifty eight percent of all housekeepers
Speaker 1: face sexual assault. Another thing that is also should be
Speaker 1: noted is that a lot of hotel housekeepers are undocumented,
Speaker 1: so the likelihood of their bringing a claim or a
Speaker 1: complaint against a guest would be not as likely compared
Speaker 1: to documented individuals. Is this legislation and this movement to
Speaker 1: implement the legislation maybe in other cities or other states.
Speaker 1: Is this springing from all the recent attention that's been
Speaker 1: paid to sexual assault as a result of the Me
Speaker 1: too movement? Or does this predate that and it's just
Speaker 1: a coincidence that everyone is now talking about this. So
Speaker 1: the Me Too movement has certainly increased the visibility of
Speaker 1: this movement in general of adding panic buttons into hotels
Speaker 1: or giving them to hotel workers. However, unite here brought
Speaker 1: this to the public's attention after that infamous incident with
Speaker 1: Dominique Strauss KHN, the French diplomat who allegedly raped a
Speaker 1: hotel housekeeper in twenty eleven. Since then, unite here has
Speaker 1: been pretty active in either lobbying companies and getting collective
Speaker 1: bargaining agreements with a lot of the housekeepers who are unionized,
Speaker 1: and in doing so have also lended their efforts to
Speaker 1: bringing in legislation for cities. This bill has been moving
Speaker 1: through the California legislature, with committees taking action as recently
Speaker 1: as last week, but not everyone's on board. In a minute,
Speaker 1: we'll get to the arguments against it, But first I
Speaker 1: wanted to remind you that we have a hashtag, and
Speaker 1: that hashtag is parts per B. Don't forget to use
Speaker 1: that hashtag on social media to chat with us and
Speaker 1: ask us all the questions you've been dying to hear
Speaker 1: us answer or maybe just artfully obeyed. So once again,
Speaker 1: that hashtag is parts per B. Use it all right,
Speaker 1: we're back. We're talking with Bloomberg Occupational safety reporter Fatima Hussein.
Speaker 1: Fatima says hotels and other business groups aren't thrilled about
Speaker 1: the bill in California that would require hotels to give
Speaker 1: all of their workers panic buttons. Aside from the argument
Speaker 1: they make that sexual harassment and assault happens in every industry,
Speaker 1: the hotel industry is no different. They make the due
Speaker 1: process claim about the blacklist, stating that people wouldn't want
Speaker 1: to stay in California hotels anymore. And on top of that,
Speaker 1: the extreme cost to hotels. Not only would they have
Speaker 1: to outfit each housekeeper with a panic button, but they'd
Speaker 1: also have to develop a system for management to be
Speaker 1: able to run to the help of a housekeeper in trouble.
Speaker 1: So it's not necessarily just the cost of the button itself,
Speaker 1: but also the creating the traditional security. Yeah, exactly. Although
Speaker 1: it's simp It's funny you mentioned that, you know, one
Speaker 1: of their arguments is that this is you know, all
Speaker 1: workers in many different industries are threatened, and you know,
Speaker 1: bisexual harassment or sexual assault. That seems like an argument
Speaker 1: for expanding this to other sectors. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: you mentioned in your story that hotel workers are not
Speaker 1: the only ones who have talked about potentially using panic buttons.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about some of the
Speaker 1: other industries that where workers are saying we need more protection. Sure? So,
Speaker 1: I spoke with an individual who works at a bar
Speaker 1: in a hotel and she told me anonymously that she
Speaker 1: faces harassment constantly in her job and knows of many
Speaker 1: people who face harassment in their jobs. And we know
Speaker 1: from statistics and the increased visibility of harassment studies in
Speaker 1: the workplace that it happens often, so bartenders are very
Speaker 1: interested in this. I could think of a host of
Speaker 1: other jobs where having a panic button would be helpful
Speaker 1: to at least deter harassment, but right now, because of
Speaker 1: the extreme rates of harassment according to unite here study
Speaker 1: in several other studies, it's really housekeepers that are the
Speaker 1: focal point here. So we have legislation in some cities,
Speaker 1: or laws that have passed in some cities. California maybe
Speaker 1: the first state to pass a state wide law. That
Speaker 1: bill is currently going through the legislature. Let's talk about
Speaker 1: where it's at and the next steps. The Labor Union
Speaker 1: is supporting it, The Chamber of Commerce is not. What
Speaker 1: is what's going on, the likelihood of it passing, We're
Speaker 1: unsure at this point. However, it has gone through the
Speaker 1: Assemblies Labor and Employment Committee as of May second, it
Speaker 1: passed through that committee. Then it will go through the
Speaker 1: Assembly's Judiciary Committee on May eighth, where if it does
Speaker 1: go through, it will then face a Assembly vote. In
Speaker 1: California does tend to be out in front of it
Speaker 1: on a lot of these issues. People call it sort
Speaker 1: of the laboratory of democracy that you once laws passed there,
Speaker 1: they tend to spread to other states. I would actually
Speaker 1: be interested in finding out if there are other states
Speaker 1: that maybe could take up this law as well, especially Nevada,
Speaker 1: where the hospitality industry is far and away the biggest
Speaker 1: industry in the state. Yes, so Las Vegas is considering
Speaker 1: adding panic button legislation for workers through collective bargaining agreements.
Speaker 1: So we see when cities take on this type of
Speaker 1: topic or this issue, it's usually through the collective bargaining
Speaker 1: process and then they face pressure to pass legislation. That's
Speaker 1: what we're seeing in Las Vegas right now. We've seen
Speaker 1: it in Long Beach in Miami Beach is also facing
Speaker 1: a similar issue. Get this from sort of a fifty
Speaker 1: thousand foot level. Do you think that with this new technology,
Speaker 1: this is going to be a new way to enforce
Speaker 1: occupational safety standards? You know, we now have the ability
Speaker 1: to have a button that you can press that can
Speaker 1: immediately call for help him. Fifty years ago that wasn't
Speaker 1: necessarily the case. Is this another example of, you know,
Speaker 1: using technology to change the way that we deal with
Speaker 1: these these sort of occupational safety issues. Yes. Absolutely. Bruce
Speaker 1: Wolfson actually wrote a story recently about how construction work.
Speaker 1: We should say, sort of veteran intrepid reporter, Bruce Rolfson,
Speaker 1: who is here at Bloomberg, you should all check out
Speaker 1: his work. He's amazing. He's an amazing reporter. He recently
Speaker 1: wrote a story about how construction workers and workers in
Speaker 1: outdoor industries and other kinds of industries use apps and
Speaker 1: other forms of technology to monitor occupational safety in one
Speaker 1: way or another. And so, of course we're seeing technology
Speaker 1: used in this way to assist housekeepers in reporting. I
Speaker 1: think we'll see it in other fields in other ways.
Speaker 1: I know that there is a concern from some workers
Speaker 1: who feel that this type of technology could be used
Speaker 1: to monitor them. So if there's a quota on how
Speaker 1: many beds they're supposed to be working on in a day,
Speaker 1: or if they want to leave the premises for a
Speaker 1: little bit while their employer watch them while they're doing that.
Speaker 1: I think in every industry, in one way or another,
Speaker 1: we're seeing concerns about how much employers are able to
Speaker 1: monitor workers. And this might be or it might lend
Speaker 1: itself to that conversation in the future. That was Bloomberg's
Speaker 1: Fatima Hussein talking about workers safety in the hotel industry.
Speaker 1: For more of a reporting, visit our website at Newstop
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Environment dot com slash safety. This episode of Parts
Speaker 1: per Billion produced by myself with help from Jessica Coombs
Speaker 1: and Rachel Daegel. Parts. Pavillion's editor is Marissa Horne. Our
Speaker 1: audio engineer is Nico and Zelada. The music tracks for
Speaker 1: this episode of PARSP Rebellion are A Message and Breaking
Speaker 1: Bad by Jazzar. They were used under a Creative Commons
Speaker 1: Attribution Share a Like license. More information can be found
Speaker 1: at betterwith music dot com