The Guild continues its ongoing social media campaign with a new message on the marquee at the Times Union Center. This message tells people to keep up with the latest on our web page, our twitter hashtag #tufamilies or through our Facebook postings.

Our members just wrapped up a Facebook campaign posting pictures of themselves holding signs about what the ongoing 7.5 year wage freeze means to them. We have also launched a Twitter effort using the Peeps candy _ joined with the #tupeeps hashtag being used by the newspaper _ to highlight the wage freeze.

We asked our members what going 7.5 means without raises means to them.

Keep an eye out here, on Facebook and Twitter to see what they say. We’ll be posting multiple photos a day over the next few weeks. Please share using the hashtag #tufamilies.

“Are you serious!?!” asked a visitor to the Times Union-sponsored Home Show Saturday after reading our latest bulletin on how we’ve gone seven years without a raise.

The bulletin focused on the “timesunionMINUS” program. It discussed how rising costs and stagnant wages are making employees lose money year over year.

A special thanks to Luke Carleo for braving the cold to join his dad as we handed out our bulletins.

As many people now know, the Times Union has begun charging for access to its premium, locally-created stories and other content under a program called TU Plus.

At as little as $1 a week for digital-only access, TU Plus is a great value, and the Guild fully embraces this effort to support the quality journalism produced at the Times Union each and every day.

But the Guild also wants the community to remember, at a time when the Times Union is asking its readers for greater financial support, that the workers who make the Times Union what it is have gone for seven years _ and counting _ under a wage freeze.

The freeze stems from the company’s insistence that the Guild surrender seniority and outsourcing rights in exchange for a very modest one-shot payment, but no raise in annual salary. The Guild has declined to submit to this.

With wages frozen, the average TU family has seen their standard of living drop by about 20 percent during this time as the cost of living continues to increase.

So if the owners of the Times Union really believe in TU Plus, they need to apply it not only to their readers, also to the people who are working harder than ever at the newspaper to create the stories, shoot the photographs, create graphics and advertising copy, sell the ads, and deliver the product.

Please call Publisher George Hearst at 454.5555 and urge him to apply TU Plus to the people who work here.

The Disney on Ice show based on the wildly popular “Frozen” is appearing at the Times Union Center through Sunday. And the Albany Newspaper Guild is using this occasion to remind Capital Region residents that something else has been frozen _ the wages for families who work for the Albany Times Union.

Wages have been frozen at the paper for seven years and counting, with no sign of a thaw. For this period, the company has repeatedly offered one-time cash _ but no raise in salary _ in return for the union handing over all rights over outsourcing of jobs and seniority job protections _ twin demands that union leadership and its members view as leading to the ultimate destruction of this 80-year organization.

During this freeze, hard-working Times Union families have seen their standard of living decline by roughly 20 percent, when cost of living increases are combined with increasing bills for health insurance. Families are cutting back and cutting back to try to keep up. But this cannot go on forever…

During this season of compassion and empathy for others, the Guild is asking that people call up Times Union Publisher George Hearst at 454.5555 and tell him that the freeze has gone on long enough. It is time to fairly compensate the people who write, illustrate, deliver and sell the ads _ all of whom help make Times Union the important community voice that it is.