Providence Newspaper Guild - Guild Leader January 21, 2000

GUILD LEADER

Vol XI, No. 10

TNG/CWA Local 31041

January 21, 2000

PROJO `TAKE-BACKS' COST MONEY & TIME

At the bargaining table, it's known as a "take-back."

But on the street, it's called a mugging.

On New Year's Day, the company welcomed the new millennium by imposing some of its contract "proposals," taking away contract benefits and making them part of the Guild bargaining unit work rules.

Already these actions are costing union members money. And they will add up to hundreds of dollars a year if they become part of a contract.

And why?

Why take away benefits that have long been part of the contract? Because you are doing less work? Because the company isn't making more money than ever?

Of course not. Pure and simple, it's corporate theft. The company wants your money. And it's taking it without your permission.

Here are some of the take-backs:

* Loss of one of the two personal holidays now in the contract. That's the equivalent of a

day's pay. What it is really is a theft of time.

* Addition of two years of work before you become entitled to a third week of vacation. The contract calls for a three-year wait; the company is ordering you to slave away for five.

* No "free" or subsidized parking. A penalty for the Guild insisting that any change in the parking situation be in writing, in the contract. So while everyone else gets to park for nothing, some Guild members pay $15 to $40 a week.

* No pay raise, not even the measly 2 percent the company has on the table.

All of this is going on while Guild members are eating the cost of the company's other imposed conditions: new medical plans that cost more but which offer members and their families less choice.

And just to make sure that the union remembers that this is 2000 instead of 1999, the company is refusing to offer the Belo pension and 401k programs, which other employees enjoy and which generally are better than the Journal Company versions.

Not only are these givebacks, bully tactics or whatever you call them outrageous, they are also, in the Guild's judgment, a violation of federal labor laws.

The union has filed unfair labor practice charges, asking the National Labor Relations Board to find that the company is breaking the law.

The Guild believes that the law requires that while we are negotiating a new contract, the terms of the current one should remain in force.

But the company chooses to assess the Guild lots of money and time, while requiring the same amount of work the Guild was doing just a month ago.

It's not good labor relations. It's not good faith bargaining. And it's no way to run a newspaper.

It's a mugging.

Your Wallets and Purses:

NOW: ONE LESS HOLIDAY

The loss of one of the contract's two personal holidays costs you one day of your life every year. But for the company, it's money in the bank. Here's what a day is worth:

Section editor: $214.42
Reporter: $195.72
Receptionist: $101.09
Pre-pub supv: $211.68
Ad sales rep: $200.39
Janitor: $101.09

LESS VACATION

The Guild contract allows you three weeks vacation after working three years. The company's new rule makes you wait five years. It's another theft of time, two weeks more for the company, two weeks less for you. Here's how the money shifts from you to the company, the equivalent of two week's pay:

Pre-pub supv: $2,116.76
Ad sales rep: $2,003.86
Janitor: $1,010.86
Section editor: $2,144.18
Reporter: $1,957.20
Receptionist: $1,010.86