Eco-unfriendly?

6 mai 2010
Affiché par : jhendry

By: Ciara Byrne, The Canadian Press

5/05/2010

Toronto hotel guests have been proudly refusing housekeeping services by hanging "green" notices on their doors but the eco-friendly initiative is costing room attendants their jobs, workers charged Wednesday.

Employees from the Sheraton Centre Toronto Hotel, the Delta Chelsea and Delta East hotels claim recent environmental efforts made by the hotels amount to a "fake green" program.

The Make a Green Choice program at the Sheraton and the Green Stay model at Delta offer a $5 to $10 voucher for food or beverages if a guest declines housekeeping.

The initiatives are aimed at conserving energy, but workers say it's having the opposite effect.

"It's fake green because the guests put their TV on. They leave the lights on. We're not saving the electricity," said Brigida Ruiz, a room attendant at the Sheraton for 18 years.

"When we go in after three days of not being cleaned we have to use a lot of cleaning liquid and water, so that is not green at all."

Unite Here, the union that represents hotel workers, estimates 30 to 40 eight-hour shifts are lost by room attendants every week at the hotel.

While Ruiz has seniority, she said other staff have watched their shifts vanish as more than 80 guests each night are hanging the green notices outside their doors.

"You're scheduled for five days and when they (staff) collect all the green choices, you only have two days a week," said Kayann Drummond, who works in guest services at the hotel.

Staff are still trying to get back on their feet after hotels in the city took a hit during the recession, and this plan — implemented in the fall — has set workers back, Drummond said.

Less than a dozen workers voiced their concerns outside the Sheraton on Wednesday, as speakers called the program "an Orwellian take on green jobs."

The small crowd listened as Warren (Smokey) Thomas, the Ontario Public Service Employees Union president, said hotel employees support sustainable strategies but not at the expense of secure jobs.

"I want to be as green as the next person, but I don't want to be green when it's not making a difference in the green movement, but is causing people a day's pay," said Thomas.

Eco-tourism experts weighed in on the subject, saying any approach needs to be holistic, examining environmental, social and economic elements.

"I think hotels should really understand what greening means," said Sonya Graci in a phone interview.

Graci, a professor of sustainable tourism at Ryerson University, said these kind of initiatives need to measure the environmental impact, and chart the overall change in the behaviour of the guests.

Graci said she has studied the Sheraton and Delta hotels, and both have a history of strong environmental programs.

"Would I indicate that they are greenwashing? No, they are definitely not greenwashers," she said, referring to the popular term environmentalists have coined to refer to misleading green claims.

Starwood Hotels and Resorts, which owns the Sheraton, released a statement saying more than 200,000 guests have participated in the program, resulting in a reduction in water consumption equivalent to 132 million glasses of water.

More than 100 hotels have the program, and the company says those facilities have saved approximately 38,000 kilowatts of electricity and reduced chemical use by about 42,000 litres.

Delta Hotels and Resorts spokeswoman Sandy Indig said its program, which began in mid-April, will be tested for one month. Analysis and feedback from guests or employees will be weighed after that period.

"We are strictly just testing it in a small number of our properties to see what the response is," said Indig, adding she hasn't heard any formal complaints from workers or guests.

"We're always looking for ways to introduce new environmental programs to help us reduce our impact."

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