The 24th floor Hilton Los Angeles University City Hotel is a major gathering place for visitors to participate in the 2028 Summer Olympics and Paralympics.

Sun Hill Properties Inc., which manages 495-room hotels, has signed a "room" agreement with the LA28 Organizing Committee, which has reserved hundreds of rooms for Olympic fans. The city council recently approved a plan to add a second 18-storey tower to Hilton that will be opened in time for the Olympics.

Now, questioning the future of $250 million expansion. On Wednesday, the Los Angeles City Council will vote for hotels with 60 or more rooms at a price of at least $30 per hour and pay for health care for $8.35 per hour.

Mark Davis, the company's president and CEO, said Sun Hill "will definitely withdraw from the Olympics from the room" if the board approves the proposal without major changes. He said hotel investors will also kill the expansion of 395 rooms.

"Our board is very convinced that if (the board members) keep moving forward, it's dead," Davis said. "They will move the project elsewhere."

The Council voted 12-3 to guide the city Atti last year. Hydee Feldstein Soto drafted packages for minimum wage hiking, which is not only for hotels, but also for private companies at Los Angeles International Airports such as airlines and offers. According to Unite Local 11, the minimum wage for the Hotel and Restaurant Workers Alliance will be the highest in the country, and the company advocates for the proposal.

Higher wage supporters say travel workers in Los Angeles are working to pay for food and rent, which should be as many as private companies at the Olympics. They refuted the serious warnings of the hotel industry, including the idea that wages will enable new hotels to grow.

Councilman Hugo Soto-Martínez said rival Sheraton Universal Hotel, near Hilton, is already paying higher wages to its union labor force. He said the real threat to the development of new hotels is higher interest rates and economic uncertainty in President Trump's trade policy.

“So, I just don’t buy it,” said Soto-Martínez, a former hotel co-organizer, who mentioned Davis’ warning.

According to the city's proposal, the minimum wage for hotels and airports will reach $22.50 on July 1. $25 for July 2026, $27.50 for July 2027 and $30 for July 2028. In addition to these increases, a $8.35 per hour health care payment will take effect on January 1.

Business groups pointed out that two hotels have been closed in the past year, scoring four points next to Lax and Mama Shelter in Hollywood and losing 270 jobs. They say Trump's trade war is driving tourism in other countries, with Canadian tourists particularly lagging behind.

Business leaders say that once effective, on-site dining hotels will not be able to compete with non-Hotel restaurants, and the minimum wage for non-public restaurants will be much lower.

Jon Bortz, chairman and CEO of Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, said his company already scales restaurant operations at two of its Southern California properties (Kimpton Hotel Palomar and W Los Angeles West Beverly Hills), both in Westwood near UCLA.

Palomar may offset the cost of higher minimum wage by converting the restaurant into a buffet breakfast business, while W may close at least one of its two restaurants, Boz said. "We have to change the business model of these properties so there is hope for survival," he added.

Bots said the proposed wage hike and other hotel regulations approved by the city council in recent years have prompted Pebblebrook to push other markets to seek new hotel projects.

“Frankly, from a broad buyer perspective, the (Los Angeles) market has been crossed by investors,” he said.

Hotels in other areas of Los Angeles are considering similar reductions. An executive of Lightstone Group, which has 727-room Moxy+AC hotels near the convention center, told council members last year that the minimum wage proposal could result in the closure of the eighth floor of Level 8, a collection of restaurants on the hotel’s eighth floor.

Mark Beccaria, a partner at the Angeleno hotel near Highway 405, said in another letter to city leaders that he was not only closing the hotel's restaurants but also its valet parking lots, eliminating 39 jobs.

"Common sense says that when income goes down, you can't raise your salary by more than 50% in a year," he said.

Unite Local 11's co-president Kurt Petersen accused the hotel of fear, saying they misrepresented the potential impact of planned wage hikes. He said hotel owners behave like the sky is falling every time they have to share profits with workers. ”

"This 'chicken small' thing has to end. Every time, the hotel is crying in poverty, and then a day later, they do well. It's always the same routine." "What's not falling is rent and health care. What's not sustainable is that workers are not earning enough to live in Los Angeles."

The hospitality industry issued a similar warning a decade ago - when the Council approved the current minimum wage until the tourism industry flourished in the following years.

On Long Beach, residents voted last year in favor of raising hotel minimum wages, and in March, income per available room increased by 15.7% compared to the previous year, Sánchez said.

Over the past few decades, political leaders in Los Angeles have enacted many wage laws. The minimum hotel wage approved by the commission in 2014 is currently $20.32 per hour. The minimum wage for Los Angeles International is $25.23 per hour, once an hourly healthcare payment is included. Then, almost everyone else in Los Angeles has a minimum wage of $17.28 per hour, 78 cents higher than the state.

As part of the regular increase in wage laws in the city, the minimum hourly wage for hotel and airport workers has been scheduled to rise this year. Once the Council showed interest in greater growth, business leaders began to warn that hotel developers would take their business elsewhere.

Few people are as compelling as Davis, who told council members that their proposals were drafted to "kill" the expansion of 395 guest rooms in the popular city of Hilton.

Davis, whose company has hotels in the Simi Valley and Greater Denver areas of Colorado, Colorado, said his board of directors directed him to acquire real estate in markets outside of California last year to "make financial financial more meaningful with a $250 million investment."

"Owners who invest this money must look at the numbers," he said in an interview. "Any project can only survive through its numbers."

General City Hilton has paid most workers more than $25 an hour, while also providing health care services, Davis said. He said the company would need to make up the difference if the financial value of these health plans is below $8.35 per hour.

Davis said he is also working on the zoom restaurant business, which may require layoffs.

At one point, Davis’s project received support from the city’s political leaders.

Universal City Hilton early reached a deal for construction unions that promised to pay higher current wages to 1,000 construction workers estimated to work on the new tower.

In August, the council voted unanimously to seek an economic analysis that would determine whether the city should provide taxpayer assistance to the project. Analysis requested by Councillors Nithya Raman and Soto-Martínez will explore whether hotels are allowed to retain the tax share generated by the new tower.

Raman's area includes part of Universal City, he did not answer questions about the program, nor the potential impact of higher tourism wages.

In recent days, the Hotel Association. Los Angeles has been directly attracting Mayor Karen Bass to buy digital ads asking her to intervene in the minimum wage issue.

In an interview earlier this year, Bass said she hopes hotel staff “live a decent life” while also ensuring that its employers “can survive.”

“We have to make sure we can solve both – we can solve the needs of workers without weakening the industry,” she said.