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If you missed it last night...
May. 12th, 2006 04:05 pm... here's the video that aired on the Glenn Beck Show last night.
And if you can't get that to work, I'll give you the shortshort version of the long story: Fran O'Brien's has been evicted from the Capital Hilton. This wouldn't be such a big deal had Fran O'Brien's not been serving free steak dinners to recovering soldiers from Walter Reed every Friday night, an event that garnered international sponsors. One of the major reasons the Capital Hilton refused to renew the restaurant's lease is that the hotel didn't want the expense of making the restaurant ADA-compliant by putting in an elevator.
The hotel manager says negotiations broke down; the restaurant owners say there were no negotiations, that the hotel kept stringing them along with false promises until suddenly giving them thirty days' notice that the lease would not be renewed and that they absolutely had to be out by May 1. The hotel manager says they didn't renew the lease because the restaurant stopped paying rent; the restaurant owners say they stopped paying rent because the hotel stopped reimbursing them for room service orders and thus owed them more than they owed the hotel. The hotel belatedly offered to continue hosting the dinners ("We can screen off part of a ballroom"); the restaurant owners have found another temporary venue.
Milbloggers gave out email addresses for the hotel's administrators. Their readers sent so much email that three administrators shut down their addresses. Apparently the fact that all the email was polite but firm had no impact; the manager still maintains that it was purely a business decision. And the Hilton corporation has not responded to critics at all.
The American Legion offered to pay half the cost of the elevator if the hotel would let Fran's stay. To the best of anyone's knowledge, the hotel has not responded.
So the milblogging community, readers and bloggers alike, have decided to pointedly boycott all Hilton hotels. And some are even urging organizations to which they belong to avoid using Hilton affiliates for conferences and such.
IMO, even if there aren't any prejudices in play on the hotel's part (though it sure looks like there are), the corporation needs to learn that having dunces in positions of power can have a serious impact on the whole company and that "purely business" decisions can still be wrong.
And if you can't get that to work, I'll give you the shortshort version of the long story: Fran O'Brien's has been evicted from the Capital Hilton. This wouldn't be such a big deal had Fran O'Brien's not been serving free steak dinners to recovering soldiers from Walter Reed every Friday night, an event that garnered international sponsors. One of the major reasons the Capital Hilton refused to renew the restaurant's lease is that the hotel didn't want the expense of making the restaurant ADA-compliant by putting in an elevator.
The hotel manager says negotiations broke down; the restaurant owners say there were no negotiations, that the hotel kept stringing them along with false promises until suddenly giving them thirty days' notice that the lease would not be renewed and that they absolutely had to be out by May 1. The hotel manager says they didn't renew the lease because the restaurant stopped paying rent; the restaurant owners say they stopped paying rent because the hotel stopped reimbursing them for room service orders and thus owed them more than they owed the hotel. The hotel belatedly offered to continue hosting the dinners ("We can screen off part of a ballroom"); the restaurant owners have found another temporary venue.
Milbloggers gave out email addresses for the hotel's administrators. Their readers sent so much email that three administrators shut down their addresses. Apparently the fact that all the email was polite but firm had no impact; the manager still maintains that it was purely a business decision. And the Hilton corporation has not responded to critics at all.
The American Legion offered to pay half the cost of the elevator if the hotel would let Fran's stay. To the best of anyone's knowledge, the hotel has not responded.
So the milblogging community, readers and bloggers alike, have decided to pointedly boycott all Hilton hotels. And some are even urging organizations to which they belong to avoid using Hilton affiliates for conferences and such.
IMO, even if there aren't any prejudices in play on the hotel's part (though it sure looks like there are), the corporation needs to learn that having dunces in positions of power can have a serious impact on the whole company and that "purely business" decisions can still be wrong.
