Dayton Agreement
After stop-and-start negotiations, members of the Dayton Editorial Units ratified a new two-year contract in March covering newsroom employees at the Dayton Daily News and the Springfield News-Sun.
Quite a bit has changed since the last set of negotiations, making this round of bargaining especially difficult: The combined units are now comprised of 22 people, down from 57 in 2014; the two Guild newsroom units are a minority of a blended newsroom — supporting three daily newspapers and broadcast media, and in 2016 the company decimated the copy desk unit through massive layoffs that affected local officers.
The agreement includes bumps to the minimum pay of more than 10 percent, though wages are still quite low.
One of the most contentious non-economic issues was “just cause” protection. Guild negotiators demanded and won a provision that includes a specific reference to the seven commonly accepted tests of just cause.