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Annual Membership Meeting & Election of All Guild Officers
The annual membership meeting of the Albany Newspaper Guild, Local 31034, TNG-CWA has been called for 6 p.m. Thursday, September 8, 2022. The meeting will be held via Zoom.
At the meeting members will be asked to elect the seven members of the local Executive Board to three-year terms that begin Jan. 1, 2023 and run through Dec. 31, 2025. (Election Information is posted below)
You must be a member in good standing (paying dues) to participate in the meeting and to vote on any measures that come before the local.
The membership will also be asked to elect delegates to represent the Local at any TNG-CWA meetings for the year ahead.
Any other matters may also be brought up at the annual meeting.
The monthly Executive Board meeting will follow on the same Zoom call.
Please email office@albanyguild.org for Zoom login info.
Agenda
- Call to Order
- Elections — President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, Chief Steward, At-large Board Member, and At-large Board Member. Delegates for TNG-CWA meetings.
- Annual Local Report
- Update on Contract Negotiations
- Update on In-Person Training Oct. 29-20 at Albany Labor Temple.
- Other Business
- Adjourn
Election Information:
The Executive Board positions up for election are President, Vice-President, Secretary, Treasurer, Chief Steward, two (2) At-large Board Members and Delegates to TNG-CWA meetings for 2023. The Executive Board terms are three (3) years. The terms will run from Jan. 1, 2023 through December 31, 2025.
Members must be in good standing to run for office and to attend the nomination meeting. If you want to check your standing, email the Guild office at office@albanyguild.org.
If there is only one nomination for any office, and the person accepts the nomination, the person will be elected at the meeting. If there is more than one candidate for any office, a Local Elections Committee appointed by the Executive Board will conduct a mail-in ballot election.
Nominations for the office may be from the floor or by petition. Petitions may be for an individual candidate in which the name of the candidate, his/her Local unit (if applicable), and department worked listed. Such petitions must also contain the names of at least 25 members. Individuals signing a petition must be members in good standing. These petitions must be filed with Local Secretary Wendy Liberatore the election at the membership meeting. The secretary shall notify all candidates of their nomination and shall receive from them a written notice of their willingness to serve.
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Liberatore appointed Local Secretary
Wendy Liberatore has been appointed unanimously by the local Executive Board as secretary of the Albany Newspaper Guild, Local 31034, TNG-CWA.
Wendy works as a reporter for the Times Union covering Saratoga County.
Wendy has been active as a shop steward, providing advice and serving as a key member of the local’s bargaining team. Wendy completed training in May in Buffalo at the Cornell Industrial Labor Relations School program.
Wendy joins the Executive Board immediately and will serve the remaining months of former local secretary Massarah Mikati, who left to join the Philadelphia Inquirer where she is now a member of the Philadelphia Guild.
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Bargaining is Smooth then Rough
Bargaining Bulletin #8:
The Albany Newspaper Guild and the Times Union reviewed language in tentative agreements on Holidays and Employee Section and the Funeral Leave Section on Tuesday.
The Guild and Company bargaining teams continued to hold extensive discussions on expenses. While the Company wants expenses to be filed within 90 days, the Guild is seeking language that the expenses are paid as soon as possible after being filed.
The Guild had proposed free digital subscriptions being provided to employers. Since the Guild proposed this in June, the Hearst Corp. has extended free access to employees to all newspapers.
Discussion continued about cell phones, reimbursements, equipment and increasing insurance reimbursement for district managers.
Both sides also discussed providing short term disability insurance to Guild members and the status of banked unused sick time.
Bargaining turned away from an easy exchange of positions when the Company presented a written proposal to take the advertising sales force out of the bargaining unit.
Guild President Ken Crowe made it clear that this would not happen. Under federal labor law, the composition of our bargaining unit is not subject to mandatory bargaining. The Guild will not bargain away unit members.
The Advertising Department has been part of the Albany Newspaper Guild since at least the early 1940s. Over the years it has produced some of best presidents — Chris Cunningham and Melissa Nelson. The Guild Executive Board and activists have reached out to all Advertising Department unit members to tell them that we will stand by them and will not abandon them. They recognize the protections of being covered by a union.
The Company was told explicitly that the National Labor Relations Act covers our position, which was reviewed by our lawyer. The Guild gave the Company a letter to substantiate our verbal remarks.
We will stand firm and fight any attempt to attack the composition of our local.
Remember a motto that we have stood by for years — UNITED WE’RE STRONG.
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More Holidays and Expanded Funeral Leave
Bargaining Bulletin #7:
The Albany Newspaper Guild and the Times Union reached a tentative agreement Wednesday, Aug. 3, 2022, that Guild unit members will receive Presidents Day and Juneteenth off as holidays.
The Guild agreed that members working on holidays will be paid the normal holiday rate of 2.5 times their pay but that time work can no longer be banked as a future day off.
In addition, bereavement leave has been expanded to ten days for spouses, significant others, and children. For all other relatives, as outlined in the contract, five days of leave will be permitted. This is an improvement over the three days that had been allowed.
In ongoing negotiating, the company returned to pushing for a management rights clause. The Guild’s initial review was nearly two months ago when the company presented its proposal. At that time, the Guild found the proposal to be greatly overreaching and saw the proposed language as undermining the contract.
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Improved Vacation Time
Bargaining Bulletin #6:
It will take fewer years to get more vacation time under a tentative agreement reached by the Albany Newspaper Guild and the Times Union negotiating teams.
Long-time employees will no longer have to wait until their 25th year of employment to get five weeks of vacation. That will kick in after the 14th anniversary. New employees will receive their first two weeks immediately. Three weeks of vacation comes after two years of working and four weeks after nine years.
The vacation agreement was among three contract sections agreed to after bargaining resumed following a month’s hiatus due to vacations and the start of printing of the Hearst Connecticut papers at the Times Union.
Besides the Vacation Section, both sides reached agreements on language in the Overtime Wage Rate and the Guild Shop Sections.
“After 13 years without bargaining on a new contract, we are making steady progress. We have reached agreement on 12 contract sections and have held in-depth discussion on many more,” said Local President Ken Crowe, who has been at the table with Vice President Ty Stewart and Shop Steward Wendy Liberatore.
Extensive discussions have been held on getting more holidays add to the contract, expanding funeral leave, expenses, driving records and cell phones. Both sides have also talked about improving diversity.
The next bargaining sessions have been scheduled for the first and second weeks of August.
Serving the employees of the Times Union in Albany, New York since 1934.