Los Angeles Times journalists won’t be going on strike after all.
A little less than two months after its members authorized a strike, the newsroom union for L.A.’s paper of record has ratified a new labor contract. Around 87 percent of Los Angeles Times Guild members voted to support the deal on Tuesday.
The development concludes a tortuous bargaining process that lasted longer than the term of the three-year contract. As it was negotiated, the Times lost a respected top newsroom editor, underwent rounds of layoffs and implemented an AI tool that drew a sharp rebuke from the union. The union also initiated its first-ever work stoppage over a round of staff cuts.
At the beginning of the process, the Guild said its bargaining unit consisted of around 450 people. As of the middle of this year, it numbered a little over 200.
The union, affiliated with Media Guild of the West, represents reporters, editors, photographers and designers, among others, at the nearly 144-year-old institution.
“It should not have taken this long to get here,” Guild unit chair and Times reporter Matt Hamilton said in a statement. “But despite management’s repeated attempts to stonewall talks and sow division, our members endured and came out stronger on the other side. This contract is proof of our tenacity.”
The Hollywood Reporter has reached out to the Times for comment.
The deal offers members thousands of dollars in raises. Employees at the Times will receive $3,000 in wage increases in the first year of the contract, $2,750 in the second year and $2,500 in the third year. Those who work at Times Community News will receive $5,000 raises in the first year of the deal and $4,000 in the second and third years.
The contract also enshrines Juneteenth as a holiday, codifies protections around employees using their chosen names and pronouns and asserts that the paper must respond when members face online harassment. The deal requires that management disclose any mandatory drug testing in job postings and creates union-covered “per diem” positions (a move intended to limit the use of non-union freelancers and temporary workers).
The union didn’t get everything it wanted. In its statement about the deal, the Guild said that it “had hoped to maintain strong protections around seniority but managed only marginal success on that front.”
On Oct. 9, the union announced that 85 percent of its members had voted to authorize a strike amid the slow-paced negotiations. Following that development, the sides engaged in a marathon 20-hour bargaining session, the union disclosed on Tuesday. The strike-averting deal was reached in mid-November.
