Open any newspaper or glance at the headlines gracing online news sites and you’ll see a common theme: More and more hotels, resorts and other venues within the hospitality and travel industry are facing an employee shortage and are grappling with finding much-needed people to fill roles due to the recent immigration crackdown. The Trump Administration is increasing enforcement against individuals who are not authorized to work through the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Individuals who are unauthorized to work include those individuals who do not have documentation, have improper documentation or have expired documentation. Hotels and meeting venues are not immune from these raids.

As venues are having an exceedingly difficult time finding (and keeping) people to help their businesses running smoothly, it is having a trickle-down effect on association meeting and event planners’ ability to run events.

Staffing Crisis

Walk through most hotels, resorts and other hospitality facilities and you will see a wealth of foreign-born workers both in the front-of-house and back-of-house activities. In fact, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, foreign -born workers make up more than 31% of hotel employees nationwide, and more than double that in some metropolitan areas. What’s more, nearly half of food preparation workers (49.7%) and housekeepers (49.1%) are foreign-born, along with significant shares of cooks (41.3%), laundry and dry cleaning workers (41.1%) and dining room helpers (40.1%).

Robert Kraus, owner and event producer at Small Conferences, LLC, is seeing the impact immigration crackdowns are having on the hotel and event facility workforce.

“The hospitality industry relies heavily on immigrant labor especially in back-of-house roles. Stricter immigration enforcement, increased deportations and general anti-immigration rhetoric have created fear and uncertainty among these workers. This leads some to leave the industry or self-deport, reducing the labor pool, making it even harder for hotels to fill critical positions,” Kraus says.

He points out that several cities where the hospitality industry is particularly suffering include Southeast Florida (Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Miami), Metro San Francisco and Metro New York City — all of which have hospitality industries that are comprised of more than 50% foreign-born. In terms of states — Florida, California and Hawaii top the list. Due to the immigration raids, there is now a prevalence of under-staffed hotels, lengthy time frames for preparation of room arrangements and a burnt-out staff at many organizations. As a result, the quality and timeliness of services can suffer.

“President Trump said on June 12 that ‘people in the hotel and leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long-time workers away from them’ and he said ‘Changes are coming’ — but that was very short lived,” Kraus says. ‘Because, on June 17, the DHS had reversed the guidance telling staff that agents must resume conducting raids at hotels and restaurants.”

As Kraus points out, hospitality venues, including hotels, conference centers and restaurants in some areas, such as those mentioned above, are literally working on bare bones — so obviously this has affected customer service.

“You cannot provide proper servicing of rooms if you do not have enough housekeepers,” Kraus says. “Without proper maintenance staff, more rooms are out of service (OOS) or worse out of order (OOO), which means they are no longer available to sell. Some hotels will place you in an OOS room then try to charge you to upgrade to a room where everything works — you know like air-conditioning — in the summer — in Florida. Yes, this made national news. Many of us have now seen where properties are not even offering cleaning during your stay unless you specifically request it, or every three days or once a week. It’s only a matter of time, due to staff shortages in part caused by these immigration crackdowns, before you’ll be charged for housekeeping.”

As a result, meeting and event planners are having to do more of the orchestrating of events on their own. Kraus recently did an event for an international health freedom organization where he was personally setting up tables in the foyer for vendors and placing chairs on the stage for panel discussions. He normally arrives an hour or two prior to a session to make sure everything is set up correctly.

“In this case, it was about 7:30 a.m. and I could not find anyone and things were not yet ready for a 9:00 a.m. start. I looked everywhere, including back of house, for staff and no one was around. I went to the front desk — which had a long line of folks checking out and only one person was on duty. I asked for a manager. They made a few calls, but were unable to find anyone to help. So, I went about doing the set up myself,” Kraus says.

Finally, a manager and a couple of staff came to the event space about 90 minutes later — but complained that Kraus had used the wrong tables and chairs for the stage.

“I pointed out that we had to use what I could find since no one was on duty,” Kraus says. “They quickly switched them out before the session started. Later, I found that same staff was working my evening event — doing 12+ hour shifts. Yes, I gave them all a nice cash tip.”

Steps To Take

As association meeting planners incur staffing issues related to the immigration crackdown, there are certain steps to take to offset the potential impact on the ability to run events.

Kraus suggests that if you want the association and its attendees to have a great experience, be prepared to do more yourself and have to step in when needed.

“I’ve tended bar at events because they were backed up. I’ve delivered boxes from receiving. I’ve pre-poured glasses of wine. I’ve cleaned tables and took out the trash,” Kraus says. “I arrive two hours early, instead of one hour or 90 minutes, knowing labor shortages might be an issue.”

“In terms of mitigating and managing these shortages — if an association is not providing breakfast or lunch, for example, I’ll suggest to the venue they do a buffet. This makes it easier on both the kitchen and wait staff — and on the attendees so they can be quickly fed,” Kraus says.

One conference Kraus recently planned was delayed by over an hour simply because the venue did not do the buffet as asked. Because several of the waitstaff they were expecting did not show up — plus shortages in the kitchen — most of the attendees ended up needing over two hours to complete lunch.

“Because of this, my client is using a different venue for their next conference. So, for sure, it affects business,” Kraus says. “With another client, I actually had an event cancelled a few weeks prior because of ‘politics’ involving immigration. Venues are very conscious about the current political climate and security so be prepared in case you have to switch at the last minute.”

Staceyann Doria, CMP, CED, HMCC, founder and CEO of The Event Narrative, is also seeing impacts of immigration crackdowns on the ability to seamlessly host events. In her experience, labor is available but less predictable.

Planning today is not like it was before the pandemic. “I’m locking vendors earlier because it takes longer to secure reliable teams and backup coverage,” Doria says. “The added friction also is pushing prices up.” The impact of immigration crackdowns on the hospitality industry, and subsequently the meeting planning industry, is multifaceted, affecting everything from the planning process and staffing to financial stability and even community relations.

Doria suggests that you should see it as both a planner and a meeting or event attendee. For example, more properties are offering housekeeping opt outs with loyalty points as the tradeoff. Front of house is often half staffed at peak, which means longer check-in lines and less bilingual coverage.

“On the planner side, I plan for leaner banquet teams and slower resets. Menus are tightened to control prep, and engineering tickets take longer, so we build in extra response time,” says Doria, who advises that fellow meeting planners assume there will be some level of friction at events.

“Plan like an operations manager, not as an attendee. We’re also resetting client expectations: operational excellence right now means predictability over perfection, clear service standards, defined staffing ratios and service level agreements (SLAs), built-in time buffers, and a published plan B and C when labor is tight. We measure it by on time room turns, consistent meal pacing and quick engineering response, not just aesthetics,” Doria says.

Also association planners should be sure to ask the direct questions: What are the current staffing ratios? What are the average room turn times? Who are the approved backup staffing partners? Build redundancy into your plan.

“Pad timelines for both planning and execution. Watch the budget by capping overtime and agency markups,” she says. “RFP turnarounds also are taking longer. Thanks to solid partner relationships, I’m getting candid updates about staffing constraints, which is why properties and vendors are pushing for earlier contracts. Apples — to — apples pricing is up due to labor shortages. I’ve had to increase client budgets to cover true costs; negotiation or relationship capital won’t override the math.”

Industry experts agree that it’s evident that immigration crackdowns can significantly disrupt or alter hotel operations and event planning. And while some raids are paused in certain areas of the country, association event planners still face a sea of uncertainty as it relates to staffing shortages and the ability to run streamlined events. AC&F