• Welcome to the At-Large Units’ Forum
  
• Elections … AND Selections
  
• More Elections: Spikes Wins Local-wide Council Seat
  
• Labor Law-Breaking At the Journal Papers
  
• Amended Iraq Resolution Passed
  
• New Officers

Welcome to the At-Large Units’ Forum

This is the second edition of an occasional newsletter for members of the At-Large Units of the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild, TNG Local 32035.

We hope to keep you enlightened and informed of events and issues pending at the local and in the units.

If you have suggestions, contributions -- or even if you'd like to write this newsletter -- please contact the Unit Chair: Mark Gruenberg, Press Associates Union News Service, (202) 898-4825 or unionnews@hotmail.com.

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Elections … AND Selections

Members of the At-Large Units met Jan. 6 to elect their new officers, other Executive Council members and alternates, this time for 2-year terms according to the revised by-laws. Why alternates? In case somebody can't serve…and it's a good thing we did. We wound up playing musical chairs with our council seats.

All the candidates were elected by acclamation: Unit Chair, Mark Gruenberg, Press Associates Union News Service; Unit Vice-Chair, Mary Watters, Fingerhut, Powers, Smith & Associates; and Executive Council members (in order) Bonnita Spikes, MCCSSE, Josh Cazares, United Way of America and Tom Bryan, E-L & Associates. The alternates were, in order, Joe Poduska of E-L & Associates, Maureen Daly of Catholic News Service and Rob Lever of Agence France-Presse.

Then the fun began. Mary Watters hadn't returned phone calls, and at the next Executive Council meeting, it became clear why: She had been promoted into management Whoops! Vacant seat! So the first alternate, Joe Poduska, joined the Executive Council. Then Bonnita Spikes won a separate election to the Council as an At-Large Member (see next story). Way to go, Bonnita…especially since your unit is one of the smallest in The Guild. Except that now we had another vacancy. So that elevated Maureen Daly to the Executive Council. And Josh became the unit Vice-Chair. Maureen, Joe, Tom, and Mark were all at the Jan. 22 membership meeting to be sworn in. Congratulations!

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More Elections: Spikes Wins Local-wide Council Seat

Helped by a strong showing at the Bureau of National Affairs -- she ran ahead of everyone there except for their own two in-house candidates -- At-Large Units member Bonnita Spikes won a Local-wide At-Large seat on the Executive Council in the elections Jan. 15-16. Bonnita, Local 32035's human rights coordinator, will also be an alternate to the TNG conference and CWA convention this summer.

Elected to the At-Large seats were:

• Michelle Amber, BNA;
• Robert Demby, Washington Post;
• Bonnita Spikes, MCCSSE;
• David Robie, Washington Post; and
• Dennis Lewis, BNA.

Final results for the convention delegate positions were:

CWA and TNG delegates:

• Connie Knox and
• Bill Salganik, both of the Baltimore Sun;

TNG Sector Conference only:

• Mark Pattison, Catholic News Service;
• Alternate: Our own Bonnita Spikes of MCCSSE.

Congratulations, all. By the way, Salganik is the present Local 32035 President and Knox, a long-time past Local 32035 President, is a member of the TNG's governing board.

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Labor Law-Breaking At the Journal Papers

It's a classic instance of labor law-breaking, and workers at the Montgomery Journal and Prince George's Journal were the victims. The Guild was organizing the workers, had a healthy majority of signed cards, and had an election scheduled for Dec. 12. But the publisher, a rich kid who apparently views the papers as a plaything, brought in union-busters, concocted an excuse to close the two Maryland offices and shift the staff to the papers' Alexandria headquarters--in a right-to-work-for-less state. He then asked the workers to sign statements saying they would move, expecting that they would not. When all but one of the eight workers did--and when the Guild started organizing his Virginia staffers, too--the labor law-breaker took the next step. He unilaterally, and illegally, fired all the card-signers.

Needless to say, the election had to be postponed and Local 32035 not only filed labor law-breaking--formally called unfair labor practice--charges with the National Labor Relations Board, but also asked the board to seek a court injunction against the publisher, ordering him to take back the workers, with back pay, and re-open the offices. But with Bush administration pro-business appointees running the board, the chances of the court order are no better than 50-50, which means the employer can use delay, denials and appeals to outwait us, unless we hang in there together.

This case study in labor law-breaking, and the weakness of U.S. labor law for workers, was the topic of the Jan. 22 meeting, with a special presentation on the case and on labor law by WBNG organizer Calvin Zon and Susan Gervasi, one of the fired workers. The workers are getting checks from a special CWA fund established especially for victims of employer labor law-breaking, but how would you like to be out of a job just weeks before the holidays? And Susan told the membership meeting that when she first went into the struggle--for higher wages, job security, and better working conditions at the papers--she didn't know that much about unions. Now she does and she appreciates us. And we appreciate them.

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Amended Iraq Resolution Passed

Joey Hipolito, of the United Food and Commercial Workers staff unit, offered a resolution denouncing infringements on union rights in particular, and civil rights in general, from the present "war on terrorism."

Unlike his previous version, this resolution did not blast the Bush administration's planned war on Iraq by name. That proposal had drawn a strong negative reaction at the December meeting.

This one, with language similar to other resolutions passed by unions nationwide, passed unanimously, with BNA's Carol Oberdorfer commending its well-thought out language and everyone else agreeing.

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New Officers

Speaking of Carol, she's the new Secretary of WBNG Local 32035. A new group of officers entered upon their duties at the Jan. 22 membership meeting:

• Bill Salganik, Baltimore Sun, President;
• J. Darlene Meyer, Washington Post, Vice-President;
• Mark Pattison, Catholic News Service, Treasurer; and
• Carol Oberdorfer, Bureau of National Affairs, Secretary.

So if you have a gripe, a proposal or a comment, that's more people to call or contact, along with your Executive Council members, unit chair Mark Gruenberg and unit vice-chair Josh Cazares.

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