Resort worker asks mainland tourists to show aloha during crisis
Click here for updates on this story
Hawaii (KITV) — On the Big Island, a handful of resorts remain open to serve flight crews, essential workers from neighboring islands, and dozens of mainland tourists waiting out the COVID-19 crisis.
A hotel union worker who asked not to be identified says she and her colleagues are shocked by the attitude of visitors who feel entitled to access and services despite the state’s “Stay at Home” order.
To comply, hotels have cut staffing to skeleton crews, with bellmen, food servers, drivers, and tour and beach activity operators out of work.
“If you’re going to come to escape your own city, town, state’s rules and regulations for lockdown, why are you here? And then being rude on top of it and sometimes quite abusive,” she said.
Among her nightmare stories, a guest from San Francisco used racial slurs and said hotel staff should be grateful that tourists give them jobs.
She said guests are extending stays, paying as much as $200 a night, but are ignoring restrictions on where they can go.
And while the state can’t ban visitors outright, hospitality workers are asking tourists to show aloha to people working during the crisis.
“We’re all in this together, we’re all having to go through this. And it’s not easy, you know, we are all worried whether or not we are essential workers or not. We all have families to go home to also,” she said.
Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.
