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Baltimore Sun - Guild News Jan. 31, 2005 Please, Ma'am, May We Have Some More? By now, we have all received a letter from the publisher, telling us that for our "hard work, dedication and teamwork" in the past year, the management will "as a small gesture of thanks" give each of us a voucher for a free meal in the cafeteria. To paraphrase the words that Shakespeare gave to Marc Antony in "Julius Caesar" -- I come to discuss this small gesture, not to denigrate it. What was welcome in this missive was a recognition that the many successes of the Sun are due to our hard work. They were certainly not due to management decisions that, for instance, forced a panicked buyout in the middle of the year without even enough time to comply with federal notification regulations. The Sun is an extremely profitable enterprise and, according to the note, it "grew advertising revenue for the first time in four years and met our 2004 operating cash flow goal." The word is that few pieces of the Tribune puzzle managed to do this. However, beyond the lunch voucher, we will not share in whatever other bonuses were handed out for this achievement. But, again, we should not complain about such a gesture. They are few and far between at The Sun these days. Perhaps we should just say "Thank you" and move on. Not all agree. Many Guild members have been a bit upset by being offered what looks like a scrap from the corporate table. Some suggested mailing the vouchers back to bigwig offices in Chicago. But there is no reason to refuse this offer, however small. Others thought it might be appropriate to give the voucher to new hires, to welcome new Guild members who wouldn't qualify for one. Or perhaps to ask a Sun hawker, or someone in line at Our Daily Bread, to come into the building and use the voucher to buy lunch. Those seem more appropriate. Or just enjoy the lunch yourself. But we do that knowing that there would be much more meaningful ways of thanking us for our hard work. How about rescinding the $5-a-week increase in parking fees, perhaps making highly-paid managers who park free make up any shortfall in revenue in that area? How about stopping the continued rise in deductibles and co-pays that increase our health care costs every year? How about just giving us the measley $26 raise instead of instituting the ridiculous pay-for-performance scheme? And while you're at it, don't let any of your managers say that this will "allow us to reward employees," because we know you have always had the ability to pay anyone as much as you want. The only thing this allows you to do is pay people less. How about rewriting the absurd "ethics" policy that has little to do with ethics and everything to do with control -- including controlling how much money we can make doing free-lance work? How about accelerating the restoration of the company's contribution to our 401K plan? The bottom line is this: We appreciate the free lunch, but we know that we have paid for it many times over. --Michael Hill, Guild Unit Chair
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Washington-Baltimore
Newspaper Guild, Local 32035 TNG-CWA, AFL-CIO/
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202-785-3650 /Fax: 202-785-3659 © 2005 Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild. No portion of this website may be reproduced in any form without expressed written permission, except by members of the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild. Copyright of photographs is held by the photographers; reprint permission may be granted only by the photographers. WBNG is solely responsible for the content of this website. Questions or comments about this site? Contact Local32035@wbng.org |
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