St. Paul Guild

The Newspaper Guild at the St. Paul Pioneer Press

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Welcome to the internet home of the Newspaper Guild unit representing union workers at Minnesota's oldest daily newspaper.

There are about 380 of us now working for MediaNews, a privately held newspaper company that acquired the paper and three other Knight Ridder publications from the McClatchy Company, after McClatchy bought its San Jose-based rival and broke it up.

We are one of seven Guild newspaper units in Minnesota, including our colleagues and rivals at the Minneapolis-based Star Tribune. In St. Paul, we are currently working under a contract that dates to 2002 and expires in 2007. There are many fewer of us now than when we negotiated that contract, after a round of buyouts and layoffs in late 2006 and January 2007.

It's a tough business and getting tougher every day.

Read here about our work to keep the Pioneer Press an asset to the community, an independent voice and a provider of good jobs in our region.

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What the company proposes:

Eliminate the “evergreen clause,” which extends contract provisions past the contract’s expiration so long as negotiations are under way
Add a clause that would give the company broad “management-rights” authority to set and change schedules, rules and assignments, without Guild involvement
Reduce the minimum level of required Guild membership in editorial and advertising departments.

Concerns with company proposal:

The evergreen clause gives employees certainty about their working conditions until they have the chance to vote on their next contract. Eliminating it introduces uncertainty about future benefits and pay.
“Management rights” provisions do away with employees’ ability to discuss changes to their own working conditions with the company through the union. That proposed clause also would effectively limit future contract negotiations.

What the Guild proposes:

Add provisions creating a joint committee that would include employees in decisions regarding the future of the newspaper, such as areas of needed investment for improved newsgathering and customer service, expanded digital distribution and experimentation with new print publications
Add a provision that requires any company that buys the Pioneer Press from MediaNews to honor the contract.

July 12, 2007