NLRB: Hearst employees can proceed to union election
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Hearst CT Media Group offices
Journalists at papers owned by Hearst Connecticut will be voting early next month on whether to form a union.
The reporters first launched a union campaign in August of 2024, and last week won a ruling from the National Labor Relations Board that they can proceed to an election to become part of the News Guild-CWA.
The company argued to the NLRB that the petitioning workers were not one bargaining unit, but should be divided into five separate units based on the geography of Hearst’s newsrooms.
But the NLRB determination states that, “..the employees’ virtually identical skills, duties, and working conditions; the complete functional integration of the proposed unit; and the consistent interchange between employees assigned to different teams and different locations establish that the petitioned-for unit is an appropriate unit.”
More than 100 employees are eligible to vote in the election. The NLRB will send ballots by mail to the home addresses of employees on May 1. All returned ballots will be counted on May 22.
“This vote is nearly a year in the making, and we are excited to conclude this election and meet our company at the bargaining table to negotiate a contract that affirms the important work of local journalists in Connecticut,” said Brian Zahn, a reporter and organizing committee member.
Hearst Connecticut declined to comment on the developments.
Journalists and other media workers are already unionized elsewhere in the Hearst group, including at the Albany Times Union in New York and the San Francisco Chronicle.
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