Police and union will follow a script, which even specifies who will be arrested, in a march near LAX to organize hotel workers.
By Joe Mathews, Times Staff Writer September 28, 2006
Four hundred people will be arrested early this evening for blocking Century Boulevard near Los Angeles International Airport, in what could prove to be one of the largest acts of civil disobedience in the city's history.
At least that's how the script reads.
For much of this year, the national hotel workers union, labor leaders and immigrant groups have been planning today's protest. Marchers are supporting a drive to organize the mostly immigrant, nonunion workers employed at 13 hotels near the airport.
If the event goes as envisioned, organizers say, it will be a highly choreographed episode of street theater, timed for news broadcasts and peaceful enough to persuade but not enrage the public.
The Los Angeles Police Department has been involved at nearly every stage, advising organizers on how to proceed without endangering public safety. Experts say the close cooperation with law enforcement reflects a more powerful and mature labor movement, and a city government that is far friendlier to labor than its predecessors.