SAN FRANCISCO -- More than 4,000 hotel workers have reached a tentative agreement on a new contract with the owners of 13 city hotels, averting a strike and ending two years of tense negotiations.

Negotiators for the Unite Here Local 2 union finished hammering out the details of the five-year contract with the hotels late Tuesday.

The settlement followed an overwhelming vote by union members on Aug. 25 to authorize a strike.

Non-tipped workers would receive a three-dollar-an-hour raise under the new contract, and contributions to workers' pensions would increase by 70 percent, said union president Mike Casey, who called the agreement "tremendous."

The contract would guarantee full health coverage and give the union the right to organize at nonunion hotels without interference, he said.

The employers locked out all 4,200 union members for nearly seven weeks and hired nonunion replacements after the union declared a two-week strike when their last contract expired in 2004.

Negotiations are set to begin in the coming weeks between the union and at least 35 other city hotels on behalf of 5,000 more workers not covered by the current agreement.