Meltdown on Morrissey Boulevard: Unions tell Globe to pound sand

The owners of the Boston Globe (aka The New York Times) told labor earlier this year that it needed $20 million in givebacks from the seven unions in order to keep the Globe in operation.  Six of the seven unions eventually agreed, contingent on the acquiescence of the last one, the Boston Newspaper Guild.  Last night, though, the Guild rejected the new contract by a narrow margin, prompting the Globe’s owners (aka the New York Times) to declare an impasse and make unilateral changes to the contracts.

This should be … interesting:

Union members at The Boston Globe narrowly rejected steep cuts in their pay and benefits, but now face even deeper reductions as the 137-year-old newspaper looks to slash $10 million in annual expenses to keep parent company The New York Times Co. from shutting it down.

The Boston Newspaper Guild, which represents 700 editorial, advertising and business employees, voted 277-265 Monday against the new contract negotiated after the Times Co. said it needed $20 million in annual savings from Globe unions — half from the Guild.

The Times Co. demanded the concessions amid an increasingly dire financial situation at the Globe. The newspaper has struggled as readers migrated to the Internet, advertising revenue declined drastically and circulation fell. The Globe had $50 million in operating losses in 2008 and had been projected to lose $85 million this year. …

The Times Co. had said that if the Guild rejected the proposal, it would try to impose a 23 percent wage cut. It also has threatened to close the newspaper, which would require giving 60 days notice to employees and the state.

Like most labor disputes, this looks like a failure of both management and labor.  The coming collapse of the Globe should be obvious to all by now, given the sea of red ink it generates and the unwillingness of its owners to absorb more of the same.  Both management and labor are attempting to rescue a dying economic model for the paper rather than create a new model that can work for both labor and owners — but probably with fewer employees and a different scope of coverage.

The irony here is that the Boston Globe’s owners (aka the New York Times) usually takes a very pro-union stance, editorially speaking.  Now, however, the company has decided to take up union-busting.  Who knew that they wanted to emulate Ronald Reagan in his handling of PATCO?

Now that should annoy them.

Hopefully, though, cooler heads will prevail and both sides will step back from the brink.  Boston is a city that can and should have at least two major dailies, even if in a different format than the dead-tree drop.  Instead of fighting over the rapidly-disappearing crumbs from an obsolete business model, all of this effort should have gone into a creative collaboration to find a new engine for journalism.  Maybe it still will — but I think that will have to come another day.

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