Anchorage Daily News owner Ryan Binkley declined to recognize a nascent newsroom union on Thursday.
Newsroom staff announced their intention to unionize earlier in the week. They are asking for fair wages, financial transparency and a sustainable workplace environment at the state’s most widely read newspaper.
In a letter, Binkley wrote that management believes “employees should have an opportunity to decide whether they wish to be represented by the Anchorage News Guild in a free and fair secret ballot election conducted by the (National Labor Relations Board).” He did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.
Unionizing staff said the refusal delays the beginning of contract negotiations by a few weeks because employees must formally vote to unionize. Fifty percent of the eligible staff plus one vote must be in favor.
Guild members foresee no problem achieving that: Sixteen of 20 newsroom staff have publicly supported the move to unionize and signed union authorization cards, a necessary first step to organizing a union.
In a news release, Anchorage News Guild members said the decision “fails to honor the voices of the hard-working staff of the ADN newsroom.”
Employees are working with a union lawyer who is in communication with ADN’s lawyers, the California-based law firm Littler Mendelson. Anchorage News Guild criticized management for spending time and money on a national firm with a reputation as a union buster.
ADN employee and Anchorage News Guild member Megan Pacer said she was disappointed in the decision from newspaper leadership, but it isn’t stopping the unionization effort.
“We were prepared for this. We were prepared for either reaction. I think some of us may have been surprised. Some of us were certainly disappointed,” she said.