Welcome to the Business Journal Archives
Search for articles below, or continue to the all new BusinessJournalDaily.com now.
Search
"'Valley Voice' Strike Paper Distributed to Stores, Homes"
"BOARDMAN, Ohio -- The truck pulled into the designated location at 7 a.m. Saturday and within 15 minutes, 51,000 copies of the Valley Voice were unloaded by 40 members of the Youngstown Newspaper Guild, on strike against The Vindicator.By 8 o'clock the delivery drivers had left the Sheet Metal Workers union hall on McClurg Road, headed for suburban neighborhoods in Mahoning, Trumbull and Columbiana counties where they would distribute the strike newspaper door-to-door."The papers will be out in the stores by 12:30 and to the homes as soon as we can get them there," said Anthony Markota, president of the union, Local 34011 of The Newspaper Guild-- Communications Workers of America.The Valley Voice was scheduled to be distributed Friday morning but it was pulled off the presses Thursday afternoon at a printing plant in Pennsylvania after that company's management refused to print a strike paper. Another printer was quickly lined up, union leaders said.Attorneys for The Vindicator have told the Youngstown Newspaper Guild it would file a lawsuit if the union published a strike newspaper, according to Markota.The Youngstown Newspaper Guild represents 179 reporters, photographers, copy editors, circulation and classified advertising employees. Its two-year contract with the newspaper expired at midnight Nov. 15. A few hours later, pickets ringed The Vindicator plant downtown. Negotiations are scheduled to resume Tuesday, Markota said.The guild approved wage and benefit concessions in its last two contracts, the union president said, but its members refuse to approve more. When talks began last month, the company proposed additional cutbacks. By the time talks broke off, the company had offered a 1% wage hike the first year but none the second year, Markota said.At a press event Friday, he said over the last five years the buying power of guild wages has been reduced 20%. He also said the company had assured the union two years ago that non-union employees and managers would pay part of their health insurance costs for a plan with fewer benefits -- but they have not. "We think there should be equity," Markota said.Today's edition of the Warren Tribune-Chronicle quoted the general manager of The Vindicator, Mark Brown, as saying, "Everybody at this paper has been frozen for four or more years. Nobody's happy but with our situation, which the union was well aware of. We've had losses for a number of years."In an interview Friday afternoon with WKBN-TV, Brown said he was "ticked off" that the guild turned to a non-union newspaper, The Business Journal, to receive help in publishing its strike paper. "We compete with The Business Journal head-to-head for advertising," he explained.The creative services division of the Youngstown Publishing Co., which publishes The Business Journal, is providing consulting services to the guild. The arrangement was detailed yesterday in a statement from the company's president, Andrea Wood.Brown described the arrangment, according to the Tribune-Chronicle, as "one of the craziest situations I've ever heard of.''The Business Journal was unable to contact Brown for comment.Visit the Valley Voice at www.valleyvoiceonline.com"