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Strong Contract Leads CWA to Support Denver JOA
After hammering out a strong seven-year contract and exacting promises from the owners of the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News, CWA leaders are giving their blessing to the proposed merger of the two newspapers’ business operations — called a joint operating agreement.
“This is an extraordinary collective bargaining agreement and we will be urging our members to approve it,” Bill Boarman, president of CWA’s Printing Sector said. “It preserves Denver as a two-newspaper city and it includes the unions’ members as key stakeholders in the continued viability of the papers.”
Boarman and Linda Foley, president of The Newspaper Guild-CWA, said they wouldn’t have agreed to back the proposed joint operating agreement without gaining many concessions and promises from the newspapers.
“We find it difficult to support JOAs in general,” Foley said. “In order for us to do it, we wanted to ensure a number of things, and Denver agreed to do that.”
The Guild represents about 1,400 workers at the two papers and is adding about 200 more as a result of negotiations that brought more jobs under TNG-CWA jurisdiction. About 700 employees are represented by the Printing Sector.
Under the JOA proposal, both newspapers would continue to publish with separate news staffs and editorial pages. Advertising, circulation, printing and other business operations would be combined and managed by the new Denver Newspaper Agency. On Saturdays, only the News would be published; on Sundays, only the Post.
Specifically, Foley said, union negotiators had to be satisfied that there wouldn’t be any layoffs as a result of the merger, that the terms and conditions of employment as laid out in union contracts would be preserved, and that both papers would be published for the next 50 years, the term of the JOA.
“The owners agreed that their intent is to publish two papers for 50 years and, should one of them elect to get out of the JOA or leave the market, that they will first put their newspaper up for sale as a viable entity,” Foley said.
CWA and two of the newspapers’ other unions, the Teamsters and Graphic Communications, have sent letters to the Department of Justice in support of the JOA, urging federal officials to approve it without hearings. The newspapers badly wanted the unions’ backing to ease the approval process.
In fact, a Denver Post story reporting the agreement noted the political clout of CWA and its president. “Analysts note that Morton Bahr, president of the 650,000-member CWA, has close ties to the Clinton administration and if the Denver union locals had failed to reach agreement with The Post and News, Bahr might have been able to use his influence to at least ensure that hearings were held on the Denver JOA,” the July 10 story said.
The seven-year contracts affect advertising, circulation and other workers who will be employed by the joint newspaper agency. Reporters, photographers and other news staff covered by Guild contracts aren’t affected. The Post newsroom has a five-year contract that expires at the end of 2002; the contract at the News expires in October.
The new contracts include wage hikes of at least 3 percent in each of the first two years after the JOA is formed. Until then, workers will receive pay increases as scheduled under their previous contracts. After the first two years, the contracts will be reopened to discuss wages.
Under the agreements, workers can’t be laid off for two years, and the unions are optimistic that there won’t be any layoffs then, said Tony Mulligan, business agent for TNG-CWA Local 74 and president of the Denver Council of Newspaper Unions.
Mulligan said the contracts haven’t been ratified but members appear pleased with the outcome. “The reaction is that there’s some peace of mind,” he said. “There was so much unknown. It’s comforting to have something to grasp onto, to have a sense of what the future may look like.”
Said Foley: “The local union leaders led by Tony Mulligan did an outstanding job of bargaining good agreements that protect their members and ensure the health of the newspapers.”
“This is an extraordinary collective bargaining agreement and we will be urging our members to approve it,” Bill Boarman, president of CWA’s Printing Sector said. “It preserves Denver as a two-newspaper city and it includes the unions’ members as key stakeholders in the continued viability of the papers.”
Boarman and Linda Foley, president of The Newspaper Guild-CWA, said they wouldn’t have agreed to back the proposed joint operating agreement without gaining many concessions and promises from the newspapers.
“We find it difficult to support JOAs in general,” Foley said. “In order for us to do it, we wanted to ensure a number of things, and Denver agreed to do that.”
The Guild represents about 1,400 workers at the two papers and is adding about 200 more as a result of negotiations that brought more jobs under TNG-CWA jurisdiction. About 700 employees are represented by the Printing Sector.
Under the JOA proposal, both newspapers would continue to publish with separate news staffs and editorial pages. Advertising, circulation, printing and other business operations would be combined and managed by the new Denver Newspaper Agency. On Saturdays, only the News would be published; on Sundays, only the Post.
Specifically, Foley said, union negotiators had to be satisfied that there wouldn’t be any layoffs as a result of the merger, that the terms and conditions of employment as laid out in union contracts would be preserved, and that both papers would be published for the next 50 years, the term of the JOA.
“The owners agreed that their intent is to publish two papers for 50 years and, should one of them elect to get out of the JOA or leave the market, that they will first put their newspaper up for sale as a viable entity,” Foley said.
CWA and two of the newspapers’ other unions, the Teamsters and Graphic Communications, have sent letters to the Department of Justice in support of the JOA, urging federal officials to approve it without hearings. The newspapers badly wanted the unions’ backing to ease the approval process.
In fact, a Denver Post story reporting the agreement noted the political clout of CWA and its president. “Analysts note that Morton Bahr, president of the 650,000-member CWA, has close ties to the Clinton administration and if the Denver union locals had failed to reach agreement with The Post and News, Bahr might have been able to use his influence to at least ensure that hearings were held on the Denver JOA,” the July 10 story said.
The seven-year contracts affect advertising, circulation and other workers who will be employed by the joint newspaper agency. Reporters, photographers and other news staff covered by Guild contracts aren’t affected. The Post newsroom has a five-year contract that expires at the end of 2002; the contract at the News expires in October.
The new contracts include wage hikes of at least 3 percent in each of the first two years after the JOA is formed. Until then, workers will receive pay increases as scheduled under their previous contracts. After the first two years, the contracts will be reopened to discuss wages.
Under the agreements, workers can’t be laid off for two years, and the unions are optimistic that there won’t be any layoffs then, said Tony Mulligan, business agent for TNG-CWA Local 74 and president of the Denver Council of Newspaper Unions.
Mulligan said the contracts haven’t been ratified but members appear pleased with the outcome. “The reaction is that there’s some peace of mind,” he said. “There was so much unknown. It’s comforting to have something to grasp onto, to have a sense of what the future may look like.”
Said Foley: “The local union leaders led by Tony Mulligan did an outstanding job of bargaining good agreements that protect their members and ensure the health of the newspapers.”