The budding union at Lodi, an upscale restaurant in midtown, has been dealt another blow.
Workers first announced they had gathered enough support among staff to form a union early 2023. Shortly after, they say, Lodi owner Ignacio Mattos refused to acknowledge the union.
His decision forced the roughly three dozen workers to file a petition with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) for an election, which was scheduled a month later at the end of February. But despite having the votes in January 2023, when the union attempted their election a second time around at the end of February, they lost.
Organizers say Mattos hired a consultant to dissuade workers from voting for the union and that he and other management interfered with union election efforts, which led to the NLRB bringing a case forward.
On May 1, Administrative Law Judge Michael A. Rosas dismissed the majority of the charges that the NLRB had brought, and did not order another election or force Mattos Hospitality to bargain with the union. He also ruled that Mattos Hospitality, the owner of the restaurant, had violated labor laws on three counts.
“The verdict is unjust, because we showed all the evidence that the workers were misled and manipulated from every angle,” said Enrique, who asked to be referred to by his middle name out of fear that speaking up could have consequences at his workplace.
Enrique, his fellow union organizers and their lawyer, Naoki Fujita, had expected a better outcome based on a decision that the NLRB board had made in August 2023 in a similar case.
“While we continue to dispute claims that any unlawful practices occurred, we are pleased that the judge dismissed the overwhelming majority of the several dozen unfair labor practices alleged,” Gregg Gilman, the lead counsel for Mattos Hospitality and Lodi, said.
While Enrique and five of his colleagues told Documented that Lodi is generally a good place to work, they also recognized the importance of the trial’s outcome: Lodi’s restaurant union drive was one of a handful of small restaurant unions in the city as more and more workers in small-sized restaurants have recently sought union recognition, including She Wolf Bakery in the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the now-shuttered pizzeria Barboncino in Crown Heights.
For immigrant workers like Enrique, being part of this union presented important protections in an industry prone to exploit immigrant workers. Immigrant labor is the backbone of New York’s restaurant industry. Sixty percent of restaurant workers in the city are immigrants, according to a report by the New York State Comptroller. While there are no current statistics on how many of those restaurant workers may be undocumented in New York, national statistics show that 8.3 million workers, or 5.2% of the workforce nationwide, are undocumented, with 1 million of them working in restaurants.
The Restaurant Workers Union, with which Lodi’s workers decided to join, formed during the pandemic, first as a mutual aid effort and then as a union that helps smaller shops like Lodi unionize.
“The pandemic exposed weaknesses for restaurant workers in particular, compared to unionized sectors, and among restaurant workers, undocumented workers faced extremely difficult situations and the meager unemployment benefits that U.S. citizens received, they could not get those unemployment payouts,” said Eric, a cofounder of the Restaurant Workers Union and a server at Lodi. He asked to be referred to on a first-name basis due to fears of repercussions at work.
Fujita said that he plans to appeal the decision.
But the appeal might not be seen by the NLRB board for some time. The Trump administration recently removed several NLRB board members and fired Gwynne Wilcox, the first Black woman to chair the NLRB’s board (Wilcox sued the administration and a D.C. District Court re-instated her in April but the Supreme Court temporarily blocked her re-instatement in May). This leaves the board without enough members to function, and the Trump administration has not appointed Republican members to the NLRB, which other Republican presidents have done in the past.
Ellen Dichner, a distinguished lecturer in labor studies at CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies who served as chief counsel to the chairman of the NLRBduring the Obama administration, said that the Trump administration has taken many anti-worker actions.
“The president who says he’s pro-worker, and everything he’s done since he walked into office is anti-worker […], including trying to dismantle the NLRB,” she said.
As a former union member in his native country of Colombia, where Enrique used to live, he believes unions can protect workers’ rights, especially as an immigrant.
When he started at Lodi as a dishwasher, he injured his thumb while carrying a metal crate. He was no longer able to do his old job and needed surgery. He was worried he could no longer work at Lodi, but the union helped him be reassigned to another position as a barback. His employers at Lodi only gave him a small amount during the three months he could not work, he said, but his colleagues from the union helped him pay for expenses like food and transportation and stayed with him on the day of his surgery.
Enrique said they would continue to fight and appeal the decision.
“I’m an immigrant myself,” he said. “I want to fight for other immigrants so they can work freely and have job security, not be laid off with no explanation, have a good salary, and [are] able to join a union without fear.”
