Boston Globe Workers Reach Tentative Pact; Unions Offer Options for Media Jobs Crisis

by James Parks, May 6, 2009

Boston Globe workers rallied late last month to save the newspaper.

After weeks of intense negotiations, including a 10-hour session last night, The Newspaper Guild-Communications Workers of America (TNG-CWA) and the Boston Globe reached a tentative agreement early this morning that, if approved, would prevent the closure of one of the nation’s oldest newspapers. Meanwhile, in testimony today in the Senate, media unions highlighted strategies for addressing the industry’s finanical crisis.

The New York Times Co., which owns the Globe, had demanded a 23 percent pay cut and changes in job-guarantee language. Details of the tentative deal were not released, pending a meeting with Guild members scheduled for tomorrow.

The Globe deal comes as newspapers across the country are struggling through the recession, which has caused sharp declines in circulation and advertising revenue. Newspapers have laid off staff, eliminated sections, entered into bankruptcy or shut down.

Just last week, the Baltimore Sun, whose parent Tribune Co., has filed for bankruptcy, laid off 61 newsroom employees, one-third of its news-gathering operation. Some employees were fired while they were in the midst of writing and editing stories. Others were told to pack up their belongings immediately, and others were escorted out of the main newspaper building by security guards.

Writing on the Nieman Journalism Lab website, Mathew Ingram says Tribune owner Sam Zell and other big newspaper owners ran up huge debts to purchase newspapers and now their workers are paying the price:

In the case of Tribune Co.—acquired by corporate raider Sam “Grave Dancer” Zell—and several other major newspapers as well, acquisitions and corporate financing have created the conditions that led to much of the pain they have inflicted on the papers they own. Tribune Co. has built up a staggering debt load of $13 billion, and [other] chains… have accumulated their own unwieldy debts over the past few years by acquiring newspapers from family firms and smaller chains.

As the economy has weakened and advertising in particular has declined, however, newspaper owners have found it harder to meet their debt obligations. That doesn’t mean their papers aren’t healthy, just that they aren’t profitable enough to make the payments on all that debt.

In response to the layoffs, more than 50 Baltimore Sun newsroom staffers—including reporters, photographers and others—conducted a “byline strike” today protesting the layoffs and heavy-handed tactics used by the Tribune Co.

“The Tribune’s tactics are deplorable,” said Cet Parks, executive director of the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild.

Employees who poured their hearts and souls into putting out a great newspaper every day were told to get out and stay out. No fanfare, no thank you, no outplacement help, just hit the streets. Maybe that’s Big Business Tribune way, but it isn’t right. Through its actions, Tribune has demonstrated that it has little regard or respect for its employees.

This week, Guild members at both New York Times units, newspaper and digital, voted overwhelmingly to ratify a 5 percent pay cut through the end of the year. Chicago Sun-Times newsroom employees voted to accept a temporary 9 percent pay cut, and the Allentown (Pa.) Morning Call announced it will eliminate more than 70 positions—more than 10 percent of its workforce.

The loss of so many newspapers represents a great threat to the nation, TNG President Bernard Lunzer told a Senate hearing today on the future of journalism.

In written testimony, Lunzer says:

The net effect is a huge loss of information that normally feeds the news cycle across all platforms, including radio, television and the Internet. We have already seen a decline in investigative reporting and an even steeper loss of local and government coverage.

There is a legitimate public interest in maintaining a level of quality journalism within the U.S. A democracy is not possible without a substantial sharing of information amongst its citizens.

TNG and CWA are working to solve the current newspaper crisis, Lunzer says, by:

• Seeking alternative ownership models such as employee-stock ownership, cooperative ownership and improved corporate structures. TNG also is pursuing legal changes that would allow for mixing nonprofit foundation money with for-profit companies.
• Pushing for broadcast, print and Internet companies to legally share information. While TNG-CWA opposes relaxation of anti-trust laws for existing media companies, the union believes there should be ways to share information without diminishing journalistic quality.
• Urging Congress to provide tax credits for subscriptions to media and the creation of tax credits to offset the cost of employing journalists.

Click here to read Lunzer’s testimony.

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