Just as a stone cast into water creates a ripple effect, one charitable contribution made by a hotel owner in San Diego has left some meeting planners responding to angry and concerned attendees over the policies of their meeting venue—ultimately having to cancel and re-plan a host of functions—and forced the hotel to do damage control.
The proprietor of the Manchester Grand Hyatt San Diego, John Manchester, gave $125,000 back in March to Proposition 8, a ballot initiative in California that would ban gay marriage. Also known as the Protect Marriage Act or the Same-Sex Marriage Ban, Prop 8 is to be voted on in November.
Subsequently hotel workers union Unite Here allegedly have been calling meeting planners with events booked at the Manchester Grand and requesting they move their programs; and it also has put the property on its website as one to boycott. Further, the hotel was taken off an online list of "gay-friendly" hotels, operated by Community Marketing Inc., a San Francisco-based communications firm. CMI collects a $159 annual fee from hotels that are members of its program.
At the same time, the Association of American Law Schools (AALS), which is slated to have its annual meeting in San Diego in January 2009 and has contracts at the Manchester Grand as well as the San Diego Marriott Hotel & Marina, began receiving calls and emails from members who were outraged over the donation, while four AALS subsidiary organizations sent the association letters of concern—on behalf, collectively, of hundreds or even thousands of potential attendees.
Society of American Law Teachers (SALT) chair Hazel Weiser said in her letter to AALS: "SALT requests that AALS make every effort to find an alternative location for the annual meeting. If this is not possible, we ask that you limit activities at the hotel to the greatest extent possible."
Commented Louis J. Sirico, chair of the AALS Section on Legal Writing, Research, and Reasoning, who also sent the association a letter: "AALS has a policy against discrimination based on sexual orientation, and we wanted the association to abide by its policy."
Consequently, AALS' executive committee met and decided to retain its 4,500-room-night block at the Hyatt but move all meetings it will hold during the conference—and the number of those are "well into the hundreds," according to executive director Carl Monk—to the Marriott.
"We chose to hold the meetings in the Marriott because we felt that's where the greater number of people would feel comfortable," he said.
Both AALS and the hotel said the group is operating within its contractual rights. The group had a food and beverage revenue minimum at the Manchester Grand, according to Kelly Commerford, the hotel's director of marketing, but many law schools and other organizations plan events at the hotels during the conference; so far those functions booked about half of the 75,000 sf of meeting space that AALS had been expected to use.
Additionally, Monk said the association will notify attendees of all of their housing options. On the possibility of attrition damages, he said, "We are not concerned," but declined to elaborate. And, he acknowledged: "We have already done some reasonably good checking on availability of hotels that aren't part of the block."
The group has played fair, said attorney John Foster. "AALS may just be trying to cover its bases, or it may be contemplating whether it can make up its room block elsewhere in order to cancel the Hyatt contract. That's within their rights; it's not illegal, immoral, or 'fattening' to breach a contract, as long as it gets paid for."
Meanwhile, the hotel was scheduled to sponsor an event by the Gay & Lesbian Alliance, but the group declined the support and moved its program. A local group also canceled a function.
Commerford said he couldn't say if some attendees at last month's American Society of Association Executives annual citywide conference chose to stay away from the hotel but said the property was sold out during the event.
Still, the Manchester Grand isn't taking the potential loss of business lightly.
"Of course we're concerned," Commerford said. "Any business targeted by a union would be, but it's the union that's creating an issue."
The property provided a letter to ASAE attendees outlining its support of the gay community and bought a full-page ad in industry publication USAE. Further, it created a four-minute video on diversity that was to be mailed to 1,200 customers this month, along with a new letter and copies of the previously created materials. Despite the warnings, a reception held on Aug. 19 celebrating diversity and Hyatt Corp.'s donation of $500,000 for ASAE's diversity initiatives was standing-room only.
Commerford said that Mr. Manchester does not discriminate, adding Prop 8 proposes that a church or school that teaches that marriage is only between a man and a woman lose its funding and that was what motivated him to make the donation. Hyatt does not discriminate based on sexual orientation and has been good to the gay, bisexual, lesbian, and transgender community, according to Commerford.
Further, he said, the hotel is operated only by Hyatt personnel, not Manchester. The hotel's owner did not return a call from MeetingNews.
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