TNG-CWA sent a letter to Local leaders regarding the annual per capita adjustment on April 25, 2019.
TNG-CWA Constitution calls for an annual recalculation of the per capita payable on behalf of regular members employed full time, and those employees covered by a Guild contract who are required to pay fees equivalent to dues. That recalculation is done each year in April. These calculations can be seen by clicking here.
For immediate release, April 8, 2019
Contact: Bill Meyer
williamdmeyer@msn.com
330-858-3406
A member of The NewsGuild-CWA is among those who will provide testimony at a public hearing in Ohio about the devastating effects of job outsourcing on both those who lose their jobs and the community.
The field hearing, co-sponsored by Cleveland Jobs With Justice and the Ohio Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, will run from 10 a.m. to noon Saturday, April 13, at Firestone Park Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), 40 East Wilbeth Road, Akron, Ohio, 44301.
Large corporate owners with little interest in investing in local quality journalism are continuing their relentless attacks on a free press. This hearing will highlight the attacks faced not just by Ohio’s media workers but local call center workers and auto workers as well.
Continue reading “Laid-off NewsGuild member to speak at field hearing in Ohio”
This article is reprinted from the website of The NewsGuild of New York, Local 31003.
Feb. 1, 2019 – After a card check conducted by the American Arbitration Association on Wednesday, editorial employees of New York Magazine were certified to be represented by the NewsGuild of New York/CWA Local 31003.
The bargaining unit consists of approximately 180 full- and part-time editorial staffers, comprising the print and web staff of New York Media and all of its respective verticals — Vulture, the Cut, Intelligencer, Grub Street, and the Strategist. Continue reading “New York Magazine staffers secure voluntary recognition of their union”
The NewsGuild Sector of CWA will hold it’s biannual Sector Conference in Orlando, Florida next month. The meeting is also where nominations take place for all Guild-wide officers. The International Chair Person, President and Executive Vice-President positions will take nominations along with the six regional Vice-Presidents. The conference narrows candidates for any position down to two candidates if necessary. After that, every Guild member can cast a ballot if there is a contest for a position. Anyone within a geographic region gets to vote for their VP when there is a contest. In addition to this primary piece of business Organizing is going to be the central focus of discussion. The NewsGuild has reason to celebrate its organizing victories along with the large number of first contracts that have been gained in the last year. Expanding on organizing and building better networks will be critical going forward. In the end it is about maintaining a strong, caring community for media workers.
Sept. 14, 2018 – Calling themselves the Tidewater Media Guild, over 100 newsroom employees at Tronc-owned publications The Virginian-Pilot, Daily Press, Virginia Gazette, and Tidewater Review in Virginia have won voluntary recognition. Together these publications account for the dominant media market in the southeastern Virginia region. Continue reading “Virginia journalists gain voluntary recognition from Tronc and join The NewsGuild-CWA”
More than 120 members of CWA Canada face the prospect of a lockout and a strike if they don’t accept a Postmedia demand for massive givebacks coming at the same time as the company CEO has received a huge salary increase.
Members of the Ottawa Newspaper Guild began voting Sunday under the threat of lockout Thursday if they don’t accept the so-called deal. Meanwhile, members of the Montreal Guild say they will strike in support of the brothers and sisters if Ottawa is locked out.
Montreal, which Postmedia also owns, is facing the same demand for givebacks.
The 63 members employed by The Ottawa Citizen and the Ottawa Sun are feeling bullied by the company’s tactics, said Lois Kirkup, vice president of the ONG (CWA Canada Local 30205). Members are scared and angry, she said.
“And that was their tactic – to scare people into voting for a really lousy deal,” she said.
During the almost three years of bargaining, Postmedia CEO Paul Godfrey has received a 33 percent pay increase and bonuses while the Ottawa workers haven’t had a pay increase in six years.
Postmedia is demanding concessions on health benefits and sick leave that could cost ONG members thousands of dollars – members who already made concessions on the pension plan.
The 58 members of the Montreal Guild (CWA Canada Local 30111) who work at The Gazette will strike in solidarity, local President Ron Carroll said.
The executive board of the Communications Workers of America has granted strike approval at the request of CWA Canada President Martin O’Hanlon.
By Martha Waggoner, Guild International Chair
The NewsGuild-CWA and newspapers owners and managers agree on one issue: the tariff increase on paper is wrong and should be eliminated.
The International Trade Commission meets Wednesday to decide the issue. Among those opposing the tariff increase is TNG, through its parent union, the Communications Workers of America. Newspapers have blamed the tariff increase for layoffs and for reductions in print editions.
CWA President Chris Shelton wrote a letter to the commission, urging that it consider the effects of the tariffs on the U.S. news industry. The commission is an independent government agency that will decide whether to maintain the tariff on uncoated groundwood paper.
In his letter written to the commission in July, Shelton references TNG as representing 25,000 journalists and other media workers. He lists the many problems facing the troubled media industry, including a 30 percent decline in newspaper subscriptions over the past decade.
“Given the upheaval already facing the newspaper industry, I am concerned that steep duties on imported uncoated groundwood paper from Canada could make it even harder for newspapers to succeed in the current economic environment,” Shelton wrote in his letter to David Johanson, chair of the commission.
One paper factory in Washington state, North Pacific Paper Co., and its private-equity owner, One Rock Capital, requested the tariff, The Wall Street Journal and other newspapers have reported. The 87-year-old partner of One Rock Capital, John A. Georges, owns multi-million-dollar homes, as does his son, who’s also a partner at One Rock.
Terrance C.Z. Egger, publisher of the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News, told the Inquirer that the tariff “is extremely onerous, unfair and totally unwarranted. The damage it is doing to the already fragile state of the economics of newspapers of all sizes across America is severe.”
Originally Lee Enterprises had threatened to shutter the paper if the employees organized a union. See this videos from KPAX, a major broadcaster in Western Montana, and a video from freelancer Dan Brooks at the link below, or attached to this brief. Continue reading “Lee threatens to close Missoula Independent if the union doesn’t agree to shed 3/4’s of the staff”
The Washington-Baltimore NewsGuild continues to negotiate with the Bezos-owned Washington Post. From the Vanity Fair piece (click headline above): The new economy’s archetypal disrupter was a dead-tree media hero for saving the paper. But now his journalists want a bigger cut. “Bezos has done amazing things for this place,” says one staffer. “But the disaffection with Silicon Valley monopolies may be coming home to roost.”
