Reading the article, the issue did not seem about wages, but about
safety. I struggle to understand what safety issue in a bar would
require a union to correct?
Besides that, a business as small as a bar, and as generic as the skill
set required of an employee, seems that a union is not a great idea.
bp
<part15sbs{at}gmail{dot}com>
On 11/3/2025 8:59 AM, [email protected] wrote:
I found myself writing a post on a gay bar facebook page this morning.
The bar had closed due to the normal reasons small businesses close.
Someone else tried to give it a go this summer.
Their employes tried to unionize. Union supporters started to
picket. Sales trickled to a halt. So the owner first fired all the
employees (and broke a labor law) reinstated them and closed.
Big outrage amongst the gay left. Or maybe just the left (of all
predilections and proclivities).
Check out how this huge business with its thousands of employees looks
like from the outside:
102 South 600 West Salt Lake City.
Ill bet they don’t have 10 employees at the most.
I wrote both to the owner and to the folks posting on the bars FB page
that unless you have risked everything to start a small business you
have no standing. Unless you have lived with the daily burden of
meeting the next payroll you do not understand. If you think a super
tiny business like this should be subject to the burdens of a union
shop, you would be happier in a socialist country.
Here is the article in the SL Trib this morning:
As historic LGBTQ+ bar closes in SLC, owner and union organizers hope
to find ‘a path forward’
By BROCK MARCHANT, SHEILA MCCANN and RICK EGAN The Salt Lake Tribune
The SunTrapp, Salt Lake City's iconic LGBTQ+ gathering spot, "will be
closing," the bar announced on Instagram Friday — weeks after a group
of employees asked the owner to recognize their proposed union.
About 50 people were gathered outside the bar at 102 S. 600 West
shortly after the post was published Friday night. A sign on its door
said it was closed for a private party.
In September, SunTrapp Workers United (SWU) asked bar owner Mary
Peterson to voluntarily recognize the proposed union by Oct. 10,
according to a news release. Peterson told The Salt Lake Tribune in a
text at the time that her business "is too small. The SunTrapp will
not be unionizing."
But in the statement posted Friday night, she said, "I want to be
clear that I support the rights of all employees to choose whether
they want to join a union."
The business was "committed to engaging" in the next step, which would
have been a secret ballot election conducted by the National Labor
Relations Board, she said. "Unfortunately, because of the government
shutdown, the National Labor Relations Board was closed and the
election process was stopped."
The bar has tried to stay open during the shutdown, she said, but
"sadly, the financial impact of consistent protests has made it
impossible for us to remain open. As such, we will be closing the
SunTrapp on October 31st, 2025."
Natalie Jankowski, a lead bartender at The SunTrapp and a member of
the SWU organizing committee, said she and other union members have
not felt Peterson supported their rights as they have worked to
unionize with Communications Workers of America (CWA) Local 7765.
Two hours after she and other SunTrapp workers delivered a letter —
which stated that the majority of staff had signed union authorization
cards — to Peterson on Sep. 26, Peterson fired them, Jankowski said.
She added that Peterson quickly reversed the decision and reinstated them.
Still, believing Peterson had committed several unfair labor
practices, Jankowski said she and other pro-union staff members went
on strike on Oct. 3.
Since then, she said, staff members and their supporters have picketed
in front of the bar every Friday and Saturday night. Meanwhile, others
were hired to fill the positions of the staffers on strike, according
to Jankowski.
For the last two weeks, Jankowski added, the workers' lawyer went back
and forth with Peterson's attorney, unsuccessfully requesting a meeting.
"She closed down instead of talking with us," Jankowski said. "She had
every opportunity to do that."
Jankowski said she was with the group who had intended to picket
Friday night when she learned the bar was closing. Around her, she
said, some staff members shed tears. "It is profoundly sad," she said,
"that our owner saw our love for this place as a threat."
In her Instagram post, Peterson said she's "not certain" what a path
forward looks like for SunTrapp, though she is hopeful for one.
Under Utah law, a bar must notify the Utah Department of Alcoholic
Beverage Services if the owners plan to close for more than 10 days,
or it may forfeit its license. The bar owner can apply for an
extension to be closed longer (for remodeling or after a fire, for
example), but for the deadline to be extended, the DABS commissioners
must approve the application.
Derek Petersen, who said he was a former administrative assistant and
bartender at SunTrapp and now helps with SWU, was with the crowd
outside the bar Friday night. He had read Friday's Instagram post that
said the bar was closing, he said, "instead of sitting down with the
union and with queer workers. I think that's just a big disappointment
for the queer community. They deserve and the workers deserve some
kind of conversation."
Others in the community have defended Peterson, who reopened the bar
last year after a previous owner closed it. Peterson posted her own
video statement on Facebook earlier this month, where she said the bar
was in danger of closing. She acknowledged firing and then rehiring
workers after receiving the SWU letter, saying she had been "ignorant"
of the laws protecting unionization activities.
On its Instagram account two weeks ago, SWU noted: "We do not want the
bar to close. All we want is to collaborate with ownership on a
better, safer Suntrapp!" Posts on the account detail the safety
measures and workplace changes its members requested.
"The reason we unionized was not to do a takeover, was not to ruin the
bar, was not to close down the bar," Jankowski said. "We wanted to
unionize to save and preserve the bar."
The employees hope the bar reopens, she said. The SunTrapp is not just
a second home to many LGBTQ+ people, but also to many staff members,
she said, who often hang out there even when they are not working.
"We want to ensure its longevity, and we want to create policies and
rules and safety policies that really just secure the future of that
bar," Jankowski had told the Tribune in September, "because all of the
staff loves it so much, and so do the customers."
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