Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Another Round of Lay-offs at the Commercial Appeal
Posted by Flyer Staff on Tue, Dec 6, 2011 at 9:07 PM
With sadness and regret, I must inform you that the Memphis Newspaper Guild was notified today, Tuesday morning, by The Commercial Appeal that 9 Guild covered employees will lose their jobs by Dec. 20 as part of a reduction in force. The company, confirming rumors that had been swirling for the last few months, said job reductions would be made to cut expenses and achieve efficiencies in the business. The company said names of affected employees could be released to the guild later today.
Management gave this breakdown in cuts in guild-covered jobs by department: 1 in editorial, 2 in accounting, 2 in online services, 1 in advertising, 3 in operations. No information was provided on cuts of non-guild-covered employees, although it is our understanding the reduction is building-wide. This notification begins dialogue between the Guild and the company designed to avoid unnecessary hardships, as provided in our collective bargaining agreement. We stand ready to advocate on the affected employees’ behalf to make sure they receive proper credit for unused vacation/holiday time and other benefits.
Employees have a right to guild representation in meetings with the company regarding these matters. I and other members of the guild executive board will make ourselves available. Once the guild obtains the list, the information will be shared with affected employees on a strictly confidential basis. Call me at (901) 481-1829 (mobile) if you want to ask if you are on the list.
The Guild will host an informal get together for the affected employees from 6:30 to 8:30pm next Tuesday, December 13th at the Trolley Stop Market. We are also looking at having a meeting Saturday, December 17th at Emerge Memphis with a professional to assist in the job searching techniques.
Here are some things from the contract to keep in mind: It's the company's exclusive right to determine the size and composition of the staff. Loss of a job to a reduction in force isn't subject to arbitration, but the guild may initiate arbitration over whether reduction in force is the true reason for an employee's discharge.
The contract generally provides that employees departing under these circumstances shall receive severance of one week's pay for each six months of service, up to 42 weeks’ pay, provided they have been on the job at least six months. Something to be aware of, however, is that severance payments come out of the employee's eventual guild pension. Departing employees could be eligible for an additional two weeks’ pay, not from the pension, if their termination is the result of their jobs being shifted to subcontractors. For severance purposes, the pay rate is based on the highest weekly salary during three years prior to dismissal. For employees on commission, the rate is based on the highest yearly average during the preceding three years.
The company is supposed to determine who is discharged based on "relative competency, ability to do the work assigned, special abilities or qualifications for the particular function, and the length of service of any employee who is selected for dismissal”. When there is no substantial difference after application of the above, the employee or employees with the greatest total service shall be retained."
Sincerely,
Wayne Risher,
President
Memphis Newspaper Guild
Comments (25)
Showing 1-25 of 25
So sad. I sympathize with anyone who loses his/her job. It s*cks big time.
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In a way one has to feel sorry for the Commercial Appeal. The more cuts they make, the worse their newspaper becomes and, the worse the paper becomes, the fewer people who care to subscribe to it. I know they blame a lot of their current woes on the fact that more people are able to get their news on line and that may well be the cause of some of their troubles. In addition, these are just bad times when fewer people are able to afford anything other than basic necessities and, sadly, the Commercial Appeal isn't a necessity. Regardless of the reasons, I agree with the commenter above: it is sad when anyone loses his or her job and I hope the Newspaper Guild is able to help those impacted by these cuts find new employment soon. At least some of those affected are represented by a Union and that will lessen the impact. I know that it's hard to be thankful for anything when one is losing a job, but having a union behind you is one thing for which they can be thankful, despite those who, out of ignorance, pontificate to the contrary.
I too sympathize with those losing their jobs. Part of the problem, though, is with the Commercial Appeal. Over the past 10 years or so, the paper has become terrible. It reads like a highschool newspaper with about the same type of editorial content. It is an embarrassment to the city. No wonder subscriptions have fallen, and now they have required a subscription to read their online content. As a result, I go there only for the obituaries, and if the Commercial Appeal doesn't get its act together, it will show up in the obits soon.
Going to the website right now to re-subscribe....
Dangit! At Christmas too. Man, man...
Resubscribing won't get their jobs back. This is just SH trying to sqeeze more blood from the turnip. So glad they have a union to do next to nothing for them.
Not that any time is a good time for getting laid off, but why the CA insists on doing it during the holidays is beyond me. Their justification is "well, better before the holidays so you don' t spend money you won't have...."
Wonder what Rich Beanie's bonus is going to look like this Christmas?
Actually, I was resubscribing so no more people would get fired, Jeff. As I read the paper online pretty much all the time, I think I owe it to them to pay them for their work. The bottom line for local papers has gotten as thin as newsprint over the past ten years or so, and that's why these layoffs and firings occur. It isn't The Man come down on Joe Worker, or some such. The management issue may be pertinent, but most of the people who work there have little to no say in how these things go down. So I'll pay my little bit, and hope they stay in business. No offense.
As someone who got laid off by the CA in 2004, I doubt it will help much. The ownership is out of town, the management is mainly from out of town. Not sure there's a commitment to the local readership that makes resubscribing a factor. Note they are laying off two online people, yet that's where their big push is these days. And they are still hiring, if the Scripps.com site is to be believed.
Although I haven't read all of the newspapers in the U.S., I have read many of the major ones. The Commercial Appeal is by far the worst, and at its core is really just left wing propaganda and crime reports that are often very carefully worded, along with a bunch of sports news.
Hopefully, it will go out of business and be replaced by something better or nothing, which I think is preferable to propaganda and endless lying by omission.
The Flyer, which clearly leans to the left, at least tries to get its facts straight and reports the truth. I actually believe what I read in The Flyer, which is as it should be for all newspapers. Also, one does wonder why a free weekly has far better writers than the area's major newspaper.
The Commercial Appeal is so liberal, it should be printed in red ink.
uhoh, the CA is middle of the road politically compared to most major U.S. newspapers. It's hardly a left wing news organ. This is one of the right wing's memes; re-defining what is actually liberal/centrist/conservative. For instance, how tea partiers call Lamar Alexander a liberal, when he's clearly to the right of center. You don't have a problem with propaganda, as long as it's what you believe already.
I do agree it's a crappy newspaper.
I wouldn't be so sure of that. I actually looked up "meme" at dictionary.com and I am still too uncertain of what it actually means to use it in a sentence. :)
That's ok, so am I. I usually just throw it in one once in a while to see if it sticks.
Packy, Uhoh, actually I think you both are demonstrating one of the CA's principal problems: In trying to be all things to all people, it succeeds only at being everyone's punching bag. Sure, Otis and Wendi are liberal, but the paper also publishes several right-wing columnists, including the vile Ann Coulter. And since Scripps-Howard controls the presidential endorsements, they always endorse the GOP candidate, including the Bushes and McCain. Is editor Peck a liberal? Hell if I know. As Uhoh says, the Flyer leans progressive (left, liberal, whatever) in its opinion columns, reflecting its editors' (and publisher's) views, so you know where we stand, at least. Our reporting, hopefully, is as objectively down the middle as human reporters can make it.
Bruce, you are mistaken. The CA endorsed Barack Obama for president in 2008. It endorsed John Kerry in 2004. Scripps Howard stopped dictating presidential endorsement years ago. This would be a simple fact to check.
You are correct, Charles. The CA endorsed Bush in 2000, Kerry in 2004, and Obama in 2008.
I know I've said this before, but I do dearly wish the Flyer would go daily, or at least bi-weekly. As underlined by this article, it's not like there's a shortage in the labor pool. You ought to see what the Examiner is doing up here. They have armies of people passing out the paper at Metro stations for free. Their daily circulation has got to be in the hundreds of thousands, and they aren't having any trouble getting local businesses to advertise. I don't endorse all their content, but their business model is clutch.
The CA is on track to die a long, slow death until either the suits at Scripps wise up or someone puts them out of their misery, and I'm not holding my breath for the former. I'm just saying, the opportunity is there. I hope I get to see the day when y'all take your pick of the people they've laid off (and they've laid off some amazing talent) and go massive. I want to see an alt-weekly swallow whole the holdings of a big out-of-town outfit, belch loudly enough for all of America to hear, and ask for dessert.
At the very least, offering the CA some competition on the daily level would be the merciful thing to do.
And yes, I realize the correct term is "semi-weekly," but that sounds ridiculous and everyone reading knows exactly what I meant.
The problem with the CA is that its content is sorely lacking. I gave up on it many years ago, and yet I still find myself trying to go back to the paper every so often, only to be sadly disappointed. The reporting is so poor it shouldn't qualify to be called reporting. The writing is more along what I would expect to see in a blog. As for sports coverage, I've seen better in small, regional papers. The CA truly is dying a slow and miserable death. I almost feel it would be better if Scripts would just put it out of its misery.
Merc: I don't buy that the CA is dying a "slow and miserable death," at least not financially. They're just feeding us (and their union) the same "woe is us" line the rest of corporate America has been using to justify downsizing and outsourcing, even while it sits on trillions of dollars of unused (except to pay its executives lavishly) cash.
The newspaper business isn't as profitable as it once was, and the weakest players have certainly been shaken out, but the ones that are surviving are still making a healthy profit, and don't let them tell you otherwise.
Actually, bi-weekly means both every other week and twice a week. I guess the only way to know the true meaning is to examine it within the context of the sentence in which it is used. Strange, but true.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/bi-…
Marty I didn't mean financially, I meant that in journalistic terms. The level of reporting is nothing short of abysmal, and the overall quality of the writing is only slightly above that. And much to my dismay, it seems to get worse with each passing year.
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