Picketing Mailers Embarrass Post Shareholders

Washington area newspaper unions ramped up pressure on the Washington Post to bargain fairly with 400 mailers and helpers represented by CWA, when they turned out at the Post building May 13 to greet shareholders arriving for the company's annual meeting. More than 100 members of the CWA Printing Sector, TNG-CWA, IUE-CWA and the Operating Engineers, most wearing red shirts, paraded at the entrance, causing many shareholders to use a handicapped entrance separated from the sidewalk by a safety rail.

"Many of the shareholders had to cross our picket line, and I'm sure it was very uncomfortable for them," said Bill Boarman, president of the Printing Sector.

"I think that many of the people inside that building support our fight," Boarman said, referring to the paper's unionized employees. "The Post is unfair to them, too. We can't allow (Publisher) Don Graham to break the unions down."

Mailers Local 14201 President John McInerney said that after 10 months, Post Labor Relations Vice President Patricia Dunn refuses to make any changes in the company's written contract proposal that would keep utility mailers - mostly African-Americans - at a pay rate far below the journeyman mailer rate.

McInerney said there have been no formal negotiations since April 1, and that when, seeking a way to break the logjam, he asked Dunn what in the Post's proposal she absolutely had to have, she told him, "John, I have to have it all."

TNG-CWA President Linda Foley, who also took part in the picketing, said all the newspaper unions were solidly with the Mailers, who have been working without a contract since May 19, 2003.

"The Post treats all its unions in the same manner," Foley said. "They dismiss our concerns and bargain with no intention of reaching a fair contract."