Thursday, September 23, 2010

Mercury News workers OK 9% pay cut - Kansas City Business Journal:

dyakonostrlin.blogspot.com
The new contract cuts pay 7 percenft for the restof 2009, and slashea an additional 2 percent from paychecks startingh on New Year’s Day. The Medi a Workers Guild’s Northern California unit announced late last week that it had reachecd a tentative contract deal with the Mercury News for its 257 memberse atthe paper. The contact also increasezs employee health insurance contributions and makedsother concessions. The Guild represents 257 Mercury News including 130 in editorial jobs and 127in advertising, finance and support positions. A ratification meeting to discusx and vote on the proposee contract was held Monday The new contractexpires Nov. 30, 2010.
Other concessions includes reduced vacation accruals and movingthe Merc’s copy desk to Walnuyt Creek, where MediaNews’ is It owns the Mercury News and 11 other dailyu papers in the region, which include virtually all of the dailt papers in the Bay Area exceptf the and . “This is a toughj contract that will hurt a lot ofour members, but it reflectws the terrible situation that the news industryg and the country is in,” San Jose Guild Presidentr Sylvia Ulloa said in a statement published in the Mercur News . Ulloa was on the bargainingh committee that negotiatedwith management.
“The committeer did the best we could do to limitt the damage toour members, minimize the loss of jobs and to try to maintain the quality of the Mercury News.” The deal woulsd also permit management to require up to five furloughy days in 2010, move remaining circulation and finance jobs to the Bay Area News Group’sx shared services center in San Ramon, consolidate advertisingy functions in the East Bay and San Jose, hire commission-only salees representatives to develop new business, and win some additional subcontracting rights, according to the Guild. The contrac negotiations have taken place during grim times fordailyh newspapers.
Several major papers have folded in recent including the and the print version ofthe , and many majorf metropolitan papers, including the San Franciscol Chronicle , , , and face daunting financial

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