With thousands of hotel workers returning to work Tuesday after a seven-week lockout, a hotel operator said a contract agreement in the next two months could lead the way to a broader resolution of labor standoffs in Washington and Los Angeles.

"It would be good for both sides if we could get a deal done in the next 60 days," said Matt Adams, vice president of the 14-hotel negotiating group in San Francisco and manager of the Hyatt Regency. "To the extent we can get that done here, that certainly sets the right tone."

Hotel operators and union officials agreed Saturday to have workers return to their jobs for the next 60 days during a "cooling-off period," which would include an end to picketing. The union will continue a boycott of the 14 hotels.

The dispute between the Multi-Employer Group and the hotel workers' union UNITE HERE Local 2 has taken on national implications as union negotiators here and in Washington and L.A. bargain to align two-year contracts so that they end concurrently with those in several other major cities.

The San Francisco hotels are pushing a five-year deal that would avoid a potential dispute in 2006 involving workers from Boston to Hawaii.

Mike Casey, president of Local 2, said contract length has been used as a smokescreen by the hotels. It is one of five major issues yet to be resolved, including health care costs, pension benefits, the right to unionize at new hotels and wage increases.

"When they start getting off their health care cuts and start to put some real wages on the table, we'll see real progress made," Casey said.

Both sides put a hopeful spin on progress over the holidays.

"They don't ever want to go out [on strike] again I'm sure, and we don't ever want to lock them out," Adams said.

Winners in the strike include neighbors who had complained about noisy picketers outside the upscale hotels, workers returning for the holidays, and managers brought in from out of town to fill the vacated slots who are now picking up to return home.

Mayor Gavin Newsom took a strong stance in support of locked-out workers, even appearing briefly at a picket line outside the Westin St. Francis.

At the Argent Hotel on Sunday, temporary workers prepared for unemployment.

Newsom "probably did the right thing with the cooling-off," said Dave M., a former salesman working as a bartender during the dispute, who didn't want his last name used. "He wasn't thinking about us, but why should he?"

Chronology of the Hotel Lockout

• August 14 -- Union contracts at 26 hotels throughout San Francisco expire. Contracts in 34 other hotels will expire in the coming months.



• September 14 -- Ninety-seven percent of Local 2 members, hotel bellhops, waiters, chambermaids and others working at San Francisco Multi-Employer Group hotels vote to authorize a strike.



• September 29 -- Two-week walkout at four of the 14 hotels represented by SFMEG; workers take to the streets with whistles, drums and other noisemakers. Several supervisors and other elected officials join in.



• October 1 -- Owners at 10 remaining hotels lock out unionized workers.



• October 5 -- SFMEG votes to continue worker lockout beyond union-designated two-week strike. Following numerous complaints from nearby residents, police issue "quiet down" order to picketers.



• October 13 -- Two-week strike ends; SFMEG continues worker lockout.



• October 22 -- Board of Supervisors holds hearing on strike's impact.
  


• October 24 -- Mayor Gavin Newsom calls for end to the lockout and a 90-day cooling-off period.



• October 25 -- Hotels decline Newsom's request.



• October 26 -- Newsom joins the picket line in support of workers.



• October 28 -- The state rules that locked-out workers qualify for unemployment insurance. Hotel Council bashes Newsom for "an attack on the hotel industry."



• October 29 -- Local 2 members picket two Starwood hotels in Hawaii.



• November 3 -- Newsom pulls police protection from picket line.



• November 7 -- Local 2 pickets Monterey Hyatt Regency.



• November 9 -- House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi urges both sides to settle the dispute. Workers rally in Baltimore; 18 are arrested.



• November 16 -- Kaiser agrees to continue health benefits for striking workers.



• November 20 -- Hotels end lockout. Both sides agree to 60-day cooling-off period.