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After 10 Years, Worchester Newspaper Workers Win Contract
Members of TNG-CWA Local 31041 voted decisively in February to ratify first contracts at the Worcester Telegram and Gazette in Massachusetts after years of mobilization and bargaining.
The three agreements cover 200 workers in the news and circulation departments. Newsroom employees organized in 1993; circulation workers in 2000. The paper is owned by the New York Times Co., which also owns the Boston Globe.
Among gains, the contracts provide for a formal grievance procedure with final and binding arbitration, a key goal of the units, said TNG-CWA Administrator Tim Schick.
Schick said members were determined "to behave like a union, even though we hadn't yet bargained a contract. That meant aggressively enforcing the company's employee handbook, rules that management instituted during the initial organizing campaign to convince workers they didn't need a union."
The four-year agreements establish wage scales for the first time at the newspaper, with an increase of 2.5 percent in the first year for fulltime workers. Subsequent wage increases will be negotiated yearly.
The three agreements cover 200 workers in the news and circulation departments. Newsroom employees organized in 1993; circulation workers in 2000. The paper is owned by the New York Times Co., which also owns the Boston Globe.
Among gains, the contracts provide for a formal grievance procedure with final and binding arbitration, a key goal of the units, said TNG-CWA Administrator Tim Schick.
Schick said members were determined "to behave like a union, even though we hadn't yet bargained a contract. That meant aggressively enforcing the company's employee handbook, rules that management instituted during the initial organizing campaign to convince workers they didn't need a union."
The four-year agreements establish wage scales for the first time at the newspaper, with an increase of 2.5 percent in the first year for fulltime workers. Subsequent wage increases will be negotiated yearly.