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FRIDAy, MARCH 27 , 2020. WASHINGTONPOST.COM/SPORTS. PAGE C8 RE
BY CANDACE BUCKNERLakeya Young pressed her black
pants and pulled on her Capital One
Arena p olo shirt. As a bartender, Young
liked working NBA and NHL games.
On this Thursday night, when the
Washington Capitals were scheduled
to host the Detroit Red Wings, she
knew the tips would be good.
Her Lyft ride was minutes from the
arena when Young’s phone buzzed.
Earlier, she had emailed Aramark hu-
man resources, wondering why all the
hours h ad disappeared f rom her s ched-
ule. The HR manager’s response
cleared up her confusion: The game
was postponed because of the novel
coronavirus outbreak. She asked her
Lyft d river to take her back home.
Young, a contract e mployee h ired by
Aramark, was out of work.
“What are the next steps? Are we
going to be compensated?” Young
asked. “I just want to know these
things, and it just seems that no one is
giving us specific answers.”
As sports arenas shut their doors
during the widening coronavirus out-
break, some teams and owners pledged
to help part-time employees financial-
ly. But arena workers who work for
outside companies such as Young re-
main vulnerable.
Monumental Sports & Entertain-
ment, the company that owns the
Washington Capitals and Wizards, said
it would pay the wages of part-time
arena workers for the postponed
events in March, a timeline that was
later extended through April. The Los
Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Clippers
and Sacramento Kings established a
joint fund to provide financial support
for all hourly event staff workers. The
Milwaukee Bucks will cover full wages
of Fiserv Forum staffers, including
those employed by outside vendors, for
30 days.
However, contract workers in many
arenas a nd stadiums — t he bartenders,
suite attendants, cooks, retail store ca-
shiers and others in the hospitality
industry who are not employed by
teams — have not received a pledge of
financial security.
In an email obtained by The Wash-
ington Post, an Aramark human re-
sources manager informed an employ-
ee that the company “will continue to
manage to the contract which states
that there is no obligation for the com-
pany to compensate staff for p ostponed
events as long as notice is given.”
Aramark, which works with more
than 30 pro sports teams, did not re-
turn emails and messages for com-
ment.
“We recognize t he hardship that this
unprecedented situation is causing for
everyone a nd are actively working w ith
our clients, government agencies and
within our own policies to offer addi-
tional support for our hourly team
members who are directly impacted,”
Aramark spokesperson Karen Cutler
told the Philadelphia Inquirer in an
email this month.
According to Monumental Sports &
Entertainment executive Monica Dix-
on, the company committed nearly
$1 million to the part-time, event-based
workforce and, in a statement to The
Post, said it is examining additional
means of support.
“We are actively looking a t models to
assist in providing additional financial
support for our MSE family in this
difficult time,” Dixon said in the state-
ment. “We will provide additional in-
formation as this situation e volves and
continue to be grateful for and inspired
by the tremendous sense o f community
we have witnessed.”
Hannah Kane, an organizer with the
Unite Here Local 23 union, has re-
mained busy a dvocating for the 698 A r-
amark contract employees in the
Washington area who, according to
another union organizer, stand to lose
$900,000 in total wages from the stop-
page by the end of March. She has
forwarded petitions and letters and
helped workers apply for unemploy-ment. When hourly wage workers
come to her with concerns, Kane r efus-
es to lie. Kane hasn’t told them not to
worry; she says their fears are justified.
“No one knows how long is this going
on. We don’t know if this closure right
now is going to be the actual end of the
line,” Kane said. “We’re all trying to
prepare for the worst and think, ‘What
if this extends?’ And if it extends, then
people a re r eally going to be in a hole.”
Across the NBA, small business ven-
dors also a re feeling the s queeze. Jaime
Soltero Jr. owns the Ta male Boy conces-
sion stand inside Moda Center, the
home of t he Portland Trail Blazers. The
$14 price for two pork tamales still
makes him g iggle — h is company s plits
profits with Levy, a food s ervice compa-
ny that operates inside many arenas
and stadiums — but the potential loss
in profits while Moda Center remains
closed is no laughing matter. Soltero,
who also o wns a bricks-and-mortar l ess
than a mile away from the arena, esti-
mates h is business will a bsorb a 70 per-
cent drop i n sales.
“It’s a pretty scary time,” S oltero said,
“just because we don’t know the cer-
tainty of h ow long this is going to last.”
Chris Eley, t he owner of Oca i n India-
napolis, expected this time would hurt
his concession stand inside Bankers
Life Fieldhouse. However, the sports
cancellations have hamstrung his busi-
ness outside the a rena, too. This month
should have been a busy one. Instead,
Eley’s sausage businesses took a hit.
“That place has been a ghost town,”
Eley said last week of the shop he and
his wife operate inside a brewery near
Bankers Life Fieldhouse, which is the
home of the Indiana Pacers. “It’s been
kind of a shocking week, for sure.”
The 37-year-old Young, the bartend-
er in the District, also works at Walter
E. Washington Convention Center.
That i s closed as well.
Young worked at the recent Ameri-
can Israel Public Affairs Committee
conference, and she learned about a
fifth confirmed case of the coronavirus
at t he c onvention on the s ame day Utah
Jazz center Rudy Gobert’s positive test
result was announced. Gobert was the
first NBA player to test positive for the
virus, but others have followed.
The next day, March 12, Young still
prepared to go work the Capitals-Red
Wings game, puzzled over the absence
of her h ours. By the afternoon, the NHL
followed the NBA and announced the
suspension of its season. Young said
she did not receive notification from
her e mployer.
“Just nothing. Nothing at a ll,” Young
said. “No one emailed me. I had to
email or find out why through human
resources why I was taken off the
schedule for that d ay.”
On March 13, Te d Leonsis, the chair-
man of Monumental Sports & Enter-
tainment, joined the growing list of
team owners pledging support for part-
time staffers.
“We had to have great levels o f empa-
thy for those people,” L eonsis said. “It’s
easy to... say, ‘Let’s not do this any-
more.’ But then the day-to-day reality
of: ‘ Well, h ow do these people eat? H ow
do they make their rent payments?
How do they do all the things?’ ”
That same day, with another event
postponed and nothing to do, Young
was scrolling through Facebook and
came across a co-worker’s post about
Leonsis’s plan. Young commented
about it and inquired whether some-
one in her situation should expect a
check or a direct deposit. But another
friend replied that wages would be paid
only to part-time workers employed b y
Monumental Sports & Entertainment.
Young hasn’t had to iron her black
pants for a while. She wonders when
she will get to wear her uniform again
so she can make a living.
“It’s been very depressing,” Young
said. “Everything just came to a com-
plete stop. Right now as far as, like,
groceries, and rent is due. I’m very
uncomfortable, very nervous. I don’t
know what to expect or what I’m in for.”
[email protected]Part-time employees face uncertain future
With major arenas shut down because of the coronavirus pandemic,
many hourly workers employed by outside vendors are not getting paidPATRICK SMITH/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGESBILL O'LEARY/THE WASHINGTON POSTPATRICK SMITH/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
Many teams have pledged to pay their workers despite the suspension of their seasons, but workers employed by
outside vendors have gotten no such assurances. Events at Capital One Arena have been called off since March 12.ESTIMATES
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