Eugene's Closes in Wake of Strikes

Eugene's Restaurant and Pub closed recently after an ongoing strike by employees who charged the restaurant's management with unfair labor practices.

Ralph Hoagland, owner of 33 Dunster Street Restaurant and part owner of Eugene's, said yesterday the restaurant had run a deficit since he and his wife took over the restaurant in January.

Hoagland, who has filed for bankruptcy, said the strike was merely the last straw.

The Hoaglands took over Eugene's after former manager Eugene Perkins was about to declare bankruptcy, Hoagland added.

The new management offered less expensive fare and rearranged the service to improve business, Hoagland said.

Restaurant workers, however, have said that these changes did not improve service and instead worsened working conditions.

"The situation went from bad to unbearable," James Ehling, a former restaurant employee said yesterday. "People were ready to quit," he added.

Several employees last month presented a list of grievances and announced plans to unionize to Molly Hoagland, the actual manager of the restaurant.

Three days later the Hoaglands fired all their employees but told them they could reapply for jobs through an interview with the management. Several employees then began an "informational picket" of the restaurant.

When employees returned for interviews, those involved in making the grievances were not rehired and others were "questioned about how they felt about union organizing," Ehling said.

"A clear pattern of anti-union discrimination has emerged from this screening process," Ira Sills, attorney for Local 26 of the Hotel, Restaurant, Bartenders and Institutional Employees Union AFL-CIO, said yesterday.

Hoagland denied the charges, saying a few employees had fabricated the charges in an attempt to close down the restaurant.

Local 26 has filed suit with the National Labor Relations Board against both Eugene's and 33 Dunster Street, asking that the owners give back pay to the employees until the case is decided and that 33 Dunster Street hire the striking workers.

The union also charged the owners with trying to prevent union activities, firing employees because of these activities, and threatening to blacklist them so they could not find other restaurant jobs.

The suit also charges that three men working for the Hoaglands tried to intimidate strikers.

Thomas Daley and Robert Covelman, former Eugene's employees, have charged David Lauria, the head cook at 33 Dunster Street and former head cook at Eugene's, with assault in connection with a scuffle in front of the restaurant on March 5.

The Hoaglands, who own 10 per cent of Eugene's, will not try to reopen the restaurant. "We wouldn't touch it with a ten-foot pole," Hoagland said.