CWA's national town hall phone calls are always information-packed, with reports from leaders and members, but there's an extra reason for Guild members to tune in: Dayton President Lou Grieco will talk about the local's tentative contract -- the first in a quarter-century for the Dayton Daily News workers. Photo: Grieco speaks during the Guild's meeting in Cleveland in April.
How did the never-say-die Dayton Newspaper Guild reach a tentative agreement with the Dayton Daily News more than a quarter-century after the local's last contract was bargained? They stuck together. “The company kept trying to do things to divide us, and they could not divide us,” local President Lou Grieco said. Photo: A powerful silent protest in June.
With a possible breakthrough looming after nearly a year and a half of negotiations, Times corporate management inexplicably dropped a bomb on the process Tuesday by presenting two new comprehensive proposals aimed at negotiating two separate contracts: print and digital. “Given the progress that we’ve made and the very real prospect of resolving the pension issue, we could have settled these negotiations to the satisfaction of both sides by September,” said New York Guild President Bill O’Meara. “Instead, what management has done will depress members’ flagging morale even further with the Summer Olympics, the heat of the election season and a presidential vote all looming.” Photo: A silent protest outside a daily editors' meeting earlier this year is one of many ways Times' members have mobilized to support negotiations.
How many years (decades?) has it been since a newspaper editorial welcomed NewsGuild to town for a convention? In this case, it was 50 years ago this month that the Buffalo Evening News welcomed what was then the American Newspper Guild, writing an editorial that focused on the common interests of the Guild and newpaper management nationwide -- and the growing, shared concerns about "one-paper towns."
Bay News Rising, a summer project of the Pacific Media Workers Guild and the news website Fog City Journal, is giving 16 college journalists invaluable experience in media, while introducing them to the value of unionism. The 10 reporters and six photographers are paired with industry professionals who serve as mentors and are tasked with developing and executing stories focused on social and economic justice issues, including labor and women’s issues. Photo: A Bay News Rising class. Photo by Luke Thomas/Fog City Journal.
Attorneys hired by Scholastic Magazine to represent it in the current round of negotiations with the New York Guild astoundingly asked us the union to provide the company with the surveys that workers filled outprior to the talks. The lawyers claim they're entitled to the information; the Guild says its certain they are not entitled, and so far the lawyers haven't cited any case law to back up their demands.
Guild member Jim Vicini of Thomson Reuters, is known around Washington for his meticulous preparation, expertise and speed in parsing complicated Supreme Court rulings before the competition. And that’s just what he did Thursday, when the high court handed down its much anticipated health care decision. The next day, Vicini announced he was leaving Reuters after more than 35 years. "It didn’t have to be this way," the New York Guild reports. "Jim was among 29 Guild members put on bogus Performance Improvement Plans, where the point wasn’t improvement but rather getting veteran Reuters staff out the door." Photos: Vicini; Reuters DC members wear their Guild colors.
Fifteen Guild leaders from seven Great Lakes-area locals gathered in Buffalo last weekend for "Re-Imagining Leadership," an intense, immersive experience that used participatory exercises to move from theories of leadership to practical and fresh ways to solve challenging issues. Photo: Erie local Secretary Jennifer DeCecco.
Just days after representatives of the Guild and Times negotiating teams received positive signals from IRS and Treasury officials in Washington about the viability of the union's alternative pension concept, the Guild proposed the idea this week at the bargaining table.
Three years after the illegal layoff of 11 workers in 2009, tThe Albany Guild and Times Union newspaper finalized a settlement Tuesday. All 11 are receiving financial relief and three members who wanted to return to work are getting their jobs back. Local President Tim O'Brien said the case isn't just about the victory for the 11 wronged workers, "It is about the future of all our members. Never again will employees be treated the way these colleagues were.”
