At-Large Units

What's an At-Large Unit?

Local 32035's membership includes many individuals who do not have the protection of a Guild contract but who, for various reasons, wish to be affiliated with our union.

Some at-large members were once covered by a Guild contract, got promoted out of Guild jurisdiction, but wished to maintain their support of the union. Other at-large members may have left a Guild-covered workplace for a new job, but chose to maintain their membership by converting to at-large status.

Still other at-large members may work in the news and information industry, or in a job that supports the interests of The Newspaper Guild, and wish to be associated with the Guild.

All at-large members in good-standing (meaning their dues payments are current) have full rights to participate in local union meetings, to be nominated and elected for union office, to vote for union candidates, and to take part in any other activity sponsored by the Guild.

To ensure that at-large members of the local have a say in the union's decision-making, they are grouped with the local's smaller units into an "At-Large Units unit" for purposes of representation on the local Executive Council.

The at-large unit is composed of individual at-large members plus members from the following smaller units (those with fewer than 50 dues-paying members):

  • Agence France-Press
  • American Postal Workers Union
  • American Rights at Work
  • BNA Correspondents
  • Casa de Maryland
  • Catholic News Service
  • Change to Win
  • Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO
  • E-L & Associates
  • International Labor Communications Association
  • Jobs With Justice
  • Kaiser Coalition of Unions
  • Local 500 SEIU
  • Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO
  • National Association of Social Workers
  • National Labor College
  • Solidarity Center
  • United Way of America
  • Working for America Institute
  • Working America
The local's large units (the AFL-CIO American Nurses Association, Baltimore Sun, BNA, Radio Free Asia, UFCW, and the Washington Post) automatically receive a seat for their unit chair on the local's Executive Council. The Post and BNA units earn an additional delegate for having more than 200 Guild members in their workplace.

To guarantee that WBNG's smaller units have a voice on the union's governing body, the at-large members and smaller Guild units as a group are entitled to one delegate to the Executive Council for each 50 members in good standing from their combined membership total. The "unit" has more than 300 members and is therefore entitled to six delegates on the Local 32035 board.