Maine Trust for Local News workers rally to expand their union
About three dozen reporters, photographers, page designers and union activists gathered on a brown lawn adjacent to the Portland Press Herald offices and printing plant Tuesday morning to announce their drive to unionize news workers at all of the Maine Trust for Local News' weekly and daily paper operations around the state.
The News Guild of Maine, which is affiliated with the Communications Workers of America, already represents about 150 workers at the Trust's papers and aims to include the 50 or so remaining non-union jobs at the Sun Journal in Lewiston, The Times Record in Brunswick and the Trust's 17 weekly publications. Workers at the daily Kennebec Journal are represented by a separate branch of the CWA and are in the process of merging with the guild.
'More than 70% of those [50 non-union] workers have signed union authorization cards,' said Megan Gray, president of the News Guild of Maine.
On Monday, the guild filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board seeking voluntary union recognition for those workers. The guild has marked the effort as a drive for 'One Big Union.'
The nonprofit Trust is the state's largest network of independent news and media outlets. It's a subsidiary of the Colorado-based National Trust for Local News. Management at the Trust has yet to respond to union demands. Messages seeking comment were not immediately returned.
Speakers at the union rally expressed concerns about huge pay disparities between publications within the Trust, lack of job security and dwindling local content as papers are forced to work with fewer reporters and share non-local stories.
Paul Bagnall, an experienced reporter at The Times Record, said as a non-union worker he makes $18 per hour while starting reporters at the Press Herald earn a minimum of $28.75 per hour.
'With the cost of living going up, my paycheck has already stretched to a breaking point,' Bagnall said. 'I am currently priced out of potential sources of information — going out to events, restaurants and cafes due to the cost of living — and it's still rising.'
Joe Lawlor, a longtime Press Herald reporter, called Bagnall's pay shameful.
'We can do better,' Lawlor said.
Sophie Burchell, a non-union reporter at the Trust's southern Maine community news division, said her job is unfairly seen as a stepping stone, rather than a sustainable career.
'I want it to be seen as a place people can grow and thrive,' Burchell said. 'I want to see my peers and their talents thrive in Maine journalism.'
Kendra Caruso, an education writer at the Sun Journal, said the Trust isn't living up to its own journalism mission.
'Its stated goal is to prevent news deserts across the nation. However, changes the company implemented early this year, including staff layoffs, have only increased the risk of more news deserts in Maine and decreased the amount of local news coming out of our newsrooms across the state,' Caruso said.
Gray said there was no way for the Trust to continue to support local journalism without first supporting its local journalists.
'We're expanding our union because we know that we must invest in our workers in order to invest in the future of journalism,' she said.
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