A unionizing effort by newsroom employees of the San Antonio Express-News and MYSA has failed.
Staffers voted 36-31 against becoming a unit of the Media Guild of the West, according to results tallied Friday by the National Labor Relations Board in Fort Worth. Seventy-four people were eligible to vote.
It marks a rare defeat for the Media Guild of the West, which has successfully organized hundreds of journalists in newsrooms in Texas, California and Arizona.
The Guild didn’t immediately indicate whether it will challenge the elections results by, for example, claiming unfair labor practices by management of Hearst Newspapers, which owns the Express-News.
“Independent of today’s vote, my focus is on the journalism we produce, and with the support of Hearst, providing the best workplace I can for our journalists, and all of our employees,” Express-News Publisher Mark Medici said.
Employees who work in the paper’s San Antonio newsroom cast secret ballots March 20 and 21, while employees who work in Austin and elsewhere voted by mail-in ballot.
The union would have been certified as the employees' exclusive representative in bargaining over wages and working conditions if it had won a simple majority of the votes cast. Newsroom managers and supervisors weren’t eligible to vote.
In February, a group of employees had sent a letter to Hearst Newspapers asking the company to voluntarily recognize the union and to start negotiations toward a contract. The San Antonio NewsGuild said it had collected signed authorization cards from 46 of what it estimated were 68 eligible employees, or 68% of the newsroom.
Hearst declined to recognize the union, leading organizers to petition the NLRB for a representation election.
After the petition’s submission, union representatives and Hearst management presented their sides to employees during a campaign period.
Union organizers said in a mission statement that their aim was to “safeguard our future as a news provider.” They said employees were seeking fair and competitive compensation, stable benefits, career development opportunities and a workplace that celebrates differences in race, gender, age, sexual orientation and background.
Medici countered that newspaper’s journalists enjoy some of the “most generous benefits in the news industry, including top-of-the-line health coverage, generous paid time off, including 12 paid holidays, an enhanced child-care allowance and a 401(k) with an industry leading company match that is significantly better than Guild-negotiated agreements.”
During the campaign period, Medici told staffers that if they voted for a union and a contract was later signed, 15 longtime employees covered by a Hearst defined benefit plan would no longer be able to accrue benefits under the terms of the plan. That may have swayed some votes against the union.
Friday's vote bucks the trend of newsroom unionizing.
Earlier this year, the Austin nonprofit Texas Tribune and the nonprofit San Antonio Report both organized as units of Media Guild of the West. Last month, Houston Landing voluntarily recognized its newsroom union.
Other Texas newsrooms that have successfully organized and become units of the Media Guild of the West include the Austin-American Statesman, The Dallas Morning News and Fort Worth-Start Telegram.
