It’s looking a lot like Star-Bulletin employees can’t assume their existing union contract will protect them during the expected merger of Star-Bulletin and Advertiser newsrooms into a new, consolidated newspaper.
Derrick DePledge described the delicate situation in a story this morning.
If there is no buyer, the operations of the Star-Bulletin and Advertiser will be consolidated into a single daily newspaper. Advertiser employees would be offered jobs by what Oahu Publications described as an “arms-length” management services company on contract to Oahu Publications.
Oahu Publications would then choose from Star-Bulletin and Advertiser employees to staff a combined newspaper, which would lead to layoffs. Gannett told Advertiser employees yesterday that union contracts would end with the sale, while it is unclear how the deal would affect union contracts at the Star-Bulletin.
The Star-Bulletin’s contract with the Newspaper Guild expires on March 14, further complicating the situation.
I spoke this afternoon with labor attorney Mike Nauyokas. Although Nauyokas has no insider knowledge of the deal, he spoke in general terms about such situations.
In his opinion, the Star-Bulletin will be closed if it isn’t sold, and the current contract would likely not protect employees, although the company “might have to bargain over the effects of a closure.”
Nauyokas said “layoffs” may not be the proper term for what is coming.
“My guess is that he just hires who he wants and the rest are just unemployed,” Nauyokas said.
Nauyokas noted that there is no “successor clause” in the version of the Star-Bulletin contract posted on the Hawaii Newspaper Guild web site, so contract terms would not transfer over to a new “third-party company” created to operate a newly merged newspaper.
“The contract doesn’t go with it,” he said.
“It looks to me like he’s just going to shut it down,” he said, referring to the Star-Bulletin.
“Shut down means he turns the operations over to this new entity that is going to be out there and is going to employ these people,” Nauyokas said. “If the Star-Bulletin is not the employer, those (contract) obligations are all gone.”
On the other hand, Black has been willing to work with the Newspaper Guild and maintain relative labor peace. The existing Star-Bulletin contract is an extension of the deal he unilaterally offered employees after his 2001 purchase of the S-B, although the company has been seeking additional cuts.
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this is, more than likely, going to be a potential bloodbath of epic proportions for journalists at both papers. . . with the termination of the advertiser contract at purchase and the s-b ending soon, it could come down to black offering x-amount of dollars to whoever wants to work. . . that may be enough for some, but it likely won’t be near what folks were making previously. . .
it could be a bad situation, pitting folks/friends/colleagues against each other to “bid” for a job in order to survive. . . that isn’t likely to provide a great product. . .
in the end, oahu will take the hit with one main editorial print voice/watchdog and just minimal from the broadcast end. . . things will go unchecked and folks will suffer. . .
I love this. PURE SPECULATION…..and yet it reads as it’s so.
In a few months let’s see how close all the guesses and so called expert opinions are. My bet? None of them will be close. Wanna know why I think that? Cuz, ya’ll don’t know what you’re talkin about. It’s that simple.
Take care, a tsunami is heading towards Hawaii!