BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) — Former employees and union organizers are picketing once again outside the Hyatt Regency in downtown Buffalo, accusing the hotel's management company of union-busting.
John Ingram, a 20-year Hyatt Hotels employee who supervised the kitchen and catering, said he was let go on January 14.
"I was called into the office. They say they had to let us go because of budget cuts, but really it was because of the union activities," Ingram said.
The former Lackawanna councilman and NAACP president said he was influential in the workplace, but was not part of the union organizing efforts at the time of his termination.
That has changed. Ingram was on Thursday's picket line.
"We have people in that hotel cleaning 16, 17, 18 rooms. In this climate they can't really speak to what's really happening," he said.
Ingram also told me he became irritated at the management company after his colleague, Luke Sills, was fired in August last year.
Sills was the hotel's Front Desk Supervisor and was the hotel's employee of the year in 2023. He believes his 2025 termination was tied to union activity. He is now leading the unionization efforts.
"Workers here wanted a voice," Sills said.
WATCH: Former Buffalo Hyatt workers continue to protest alleged union-busting
The hotel is owned by developer Douglas Jemal and was managed by Texas-based Aimbridge Employee Service Corp until this month.
Starting in 2024, union organizers lodged complaints with the National Labor Relations Board. The board charged Aimbridge Employee Service Corp with 18 labor law violations. The case has been tied up in the courts for more than a year after the management company filed its own lawsuit claiming elements of the NLRB are unconstitutional.
A Texas federal judge ruled partly in Aimbridge's favor, but ruled against an injunction the company filed against the NLRB. That means the NLRB's case against the company can still go ahead.
To combat delay, Sills said restarting the picket is a way to put pressure on to allow a union to form, including the new management company, Remington Hospitality.
In August 2025, then-Senator Sean Ryan was on his mayoral campaign trail. He was vocal about the situation.
"The Hyatt needs to stop doing what it's doing," Ryan said.
Ryan is Buffalo's mayor. Though the mayor's office did not provide a statement regarding the continued picketing, a spokesperson said his position has not evolved since then.
