WBNG has bargained an “Effects Agreement” for the 10 York Daily Record Design Department staffers being laid off because of a Gannett consolidation in which daily layout tasks are being “moved” to Louisville, Ky.
The workers produce the daily newspaper and also handle design duties for three other Gannett-owned dailies in south-central Pennsylvania: the Chambersburg Public Opinion, the Hanover Sun, and the Lebanon Daily News. The YDR workers had been given the required 90-days’ notice of the layoffs in August; they were not given the option of a transfer to Louisville.
Under the effects agreement, the employees will be kept on the payroll until mid-November.
The WBNG-negotiated deal signed in October enforced the one-year-old collective bargaining agreement that guarantees severance payments for those affected by “contracting out,” and gained a minimum of four-weeks’ severance pay, even for employees with less than a year of service.
The chairperson at the Daily Record unit (soon to be reduced to 36 Guild-represented employees), Bethany McKay, was among those laid off.