Union members sit in the audience listening as union reps and contractors testify in front of the Joint Committee on the Metropolitan Pier & Exposition Authority in early April of 2010. (Nancy Stone/ Chicago Tribune)
By Kathy Bergen | At a revamped McCormick Place, trade shows and their exhibitors could be
guaranteed a basic set of rights and show-floor work rules aimed at
cutting their costs, and the contractors and union workers who want the
right to work the shows would have to accept those terms.
At least that’s the legal concept behind the recommendations expected to
be issued this week or next by the state legislative committee studying
how to make Chicago’s convention business more competitive with
lower-cost rivals, according to a source close to the deliberations.