Schrager Settles Discrimination Case

A chic Sunset Strip hotel will pay a combined one million dollars to nine mostly ethnic minority bellman who were fired and replaced by cool-looking white workers.

The settlement stems from a discrimination suit filed in January against Los Angeles's Mondrian hotel, home to Oscar parties and a hip spot for celebrities including Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Moss.

The US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission claimed that hotel owner Ian Schrager had hired casting agents to find attractive employees with cool individual-looking style.

Evidence included a memo handwritten by Mr Schrager saying certain hotel restaurant employees were too ethnic. The owner said later he meant some employees had too many tattoos.

Of the bellman who sued, two were Hispanic, five were Asians, one was black and one was white. Each worker will receive about 120,000 dollars over three years, according to the settlement.

The Mondrian, a 1950's apartment building operated as a hotel since 1983, had been in bankruptcy for several years when Mr Schrager bought the property in 1995. He reopened it the following year after a renovation. The nine porters were fired just days before the reopening, according to court documents.

Schrager - who founded New York's Studio 54 during the heyday of disco - has become one of the most successful hotel owners in the world. Ian Schrager Hotels owns Morgans, Royalton and Paramount hotels in New York, Sandersons and St. Martin's Lane in London, Delano in Miami, Mirimar in Santa Barbara and Clift in San Francisco.

David Weidlich, the hotel's general manager, said the hotel was pleased to settle the case. They have taken further steps, including hiring a human resources manager, to ensure compliance with fair employment laws.

We feel badly that these former employees were lost in the chaos of reopening and that their discharge may not have been handled as sensitively as it could have been, Mr Weidlich said in a statement. But, Mulligan said, The real test is going to be obviously if you see a change in the complexion in the people who work in the visible jobs at the Mondrian. The question is when you look at the Mondrian who do you see working there in front -- not the people who clean the rooms -- but who's in front and in management.

Equal Employment Opportunity Commission:
http://www.eeoc.gov

Mondrian Hotel:
http://www.mondrianhotel.com

Logos, product and company names mentioned are the property of their respective owners.

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