Newsroom employees at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette have been on strike for more than 100 days.
While the union representing those employees says a recent ruling in its favor from the National Labor Relations Board marks a major step toward resolving the labor dispute, not all newsroom workers feel optimistic that an end is in sight. In recent weeks, a number of people have decided to cross the picket line and return to work at the Post-Gazette, citing burnout and financial stress.
Members of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh — which represents editorial staff at the paper — are receiving weekly $400 payments from the union’s parent organization, The NewsGuild-CWA.
For Mike Pound, a digital editor at the Post-Gazette, that makes up just under half of what he made weekly before striking.
“It can feel a little isolating. We don't have the ‘fun money’ that we had to go to a brewery with friends or go out to dinner,” Pound said at a rally marking the strike’s 100th day outside the City-County building on Saturday.
Post-Gazette Labor Strife
- Background: Editorial staff walked out on Oct. 18, shortly after their design and distribution colleagues went on strike.
- Their demands: Guild representatives say they want to secure fair wages, yearly raises and affordable health care. Their last union contract expired in 2017.
- NLRB ruling: In January, a judge ruled the P-G violated federal labor law by failing to bargain in good faith. He ordered the paper to resume talks and restore the expired contract.
Figuring out which bills he can pay, and when, has been a scramble, said Pound, who joined the paper in 2014. All of the striking workers who tried to claim benefits from Pennsylvania’s Office of Unemployment Compensation (UC) were denied, according to local union leadership.
Then, Pound’s wife lost her job midway through January. The couple had relied on her employer’s health insurance, and the Post-Gazette terminated benefits for striking guild members shortly after the strike began.
The Pounds now receive continuing coverage through COBRA, the premiums for which TNG-CWA is paying.
“That's been a huge relief,” Pound said.
According to Pound, a member of the union’s health and wellness committee, a half-dozen members are receiving COBRA benefits with the union’s help.
But many other union members are now without insurance altogether. Erin Hebert, who co-chairs the committee, said, for herself, monthly medical costs as a relatively young and healthy person weren't high enough to justify it, especially compared to colleagues who deal with costly chronic health conditions.
Instead, she submits receipts for therapy and medications for reimbursement from the national CWA’s member relief fund.
Since the start of October, strikers have also raised nearly $242,000 for a local strike relief fund, composed of a mix of small donations from supporters and larger contributions from other unions.
In the months since the strike began Oct. 18, workers have used that fund to cover the cost of rent, mortgage payments and plumbing repairs.
“There was no question that we would make sure that we take care of each other,” Hebert said.
Some non-striking workers say while they support their colleagues, they oppose how the strike came about
But some have begun to question how long they can sustainably live without steady work, reliable health insurance and a full paycheck. At least three reporters have returned to work after going on strike, and a fourth returned to the Post-Gazette this week after nearly four months on the picket line, citing burnout and a strain on her mental and financial health.
At this point, around 50 people are working in the newsroom, according to sources, compared to 43 on strike. A handful of others have retired or left for other employment.
Some of the employees who have remained on the job and spoke to WESA — either on background or on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation — said, while they are sympathetic to the union’s reasons for going on strike, they were unhappy with the way the decision to strike came about.
In August 2020, members of the guild voted 88-31 in favor of a strike. But that work stoppage was never authorized by CWA leadership, and it lost momentum soon thereafter.
Things changed when, in early October 2022, members of the guild’s sibling unions lost their existing health insurance. According to union representatives, Block Communications stripped more than 40 of those unionized employees of their existing health care by refusing to pay the additional $19 a week per employee required to maintain that coverage.
With CWA support, locals representing production, advertising and distribution workers at the paper walked off the job on Oct. 6.
Because their sibling unions were striking, members of the editorial guild were told by the union's national leadership that they would have to do the same. CWA bylaws, by which TNG-CWA locals must abide, state that locals must respect the picket line authorized by the union or risk losing their union charter.
For that reason, said TNG-CWA President Jon Schleuss, a vote authorizing a strike for newsroom employees wasn’t necessary, since CWA’s executive board already had ordered the news guild to comply with its request to join the picket line. But he still encouraged the guild to take it. That way, he said, union members would have a chance to record their opinion on the matter.
“I told [members of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh], if they [voted] yes, they were going to go out on strike. If they [voted] no, they were going to go on strike,” Schleuss said.
That vote, held Oct. 17, authorized an unfair labor practice strike — but by a much slimmer margin than the 2020 vote: 38-36. Employees who decided to stay on the job after the vote said they felt they had few practical alternatives, given the speed with which the process played out.
“It was all happening so fast, and it didn't feel like we were included in the discussion,” said one non-striking newsroom worker.
While guild leaders had introduced plans for the strike fund and benefits prior to the vote, that worker said she didn’t feel confident enough to take a leap of faith and strike without a definite financial safety net to keep her afloat.
“I didn't feel comfortable jumping when it was something that I didn't get to decide on,” she said.
She said she had considered joining the picket line once those plans were more established, but public callouts of non-striking workers gave her pause.
And several union members and organizers with TNG-CWA haven’t held back on publicly naming names. On Twitter, they have disavowed “scabs,” or people crossing the picket line, and named Post-Gazette employees that some union members allege have seized on the strike to bolster their own earnings.
While declining to speak about it on the record, multiple non-striking workers have disputed whether those raises occurred before or after the union initiated the strike.
“I think that the union will get what it wants eventually, and I think that's good,” the employee said. “I don't agree with tearing down your fellow colleagues in the process.”
“That's not helping us with our end goal,” she continued. “That's not going to get us health care. That's not going to get us a contract. That's what matters.”
But Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh President Zack Tanner said anyone who continues to work at the paper during the work stoppage weakens the striking workers’ position. Calling people “scabs” publicly, he said, is one labor tactic used historically to disrupt the promotion of strike-breaking work and discourage people from doing so while the strike continues.
“As far as it being hard on their reputation moving forward, I think if everybody in the newspaper guild would have gone on strike on day one, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now,” Tanner continued. “Nobody would have an ill reputation because I think this would have wrapped up pretty quickly.”
Is an end in sight?
As the strike approaches the completion of its fourth month, it remains unclear whether the union employees and Post-Gazette management will reach an agreement anytime soon.
Last month, an administrative law judge for the NLRB issued a decision that found the paper’s owners, Block Communications Inc., violated the National Labor Relations Act by failing to bargain with union members in good faith.
Judge Geoffrey Carter ordered the Post-Gazette to resume contract talks with members within 15 days of the union’s request, and restore the contract that expired in 2017 while they bargain for a new one. Block Communications has said it plans to appeal the decision.
The parties have not decided on a new date for negotiations, but Tanner said the guild could meet with management as soon as next week.
The guild’s demands, he said, remain the same: to bargain in good faith, and to collectively bargain with the paper’s four other unions for affordable health care.
“That's always been part of our demands from the day we took the strike authorization vote,” Tanner said.
But to some, the terms on which the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh would end its strike remain unclear.
“The goalposts had always been moving,” said one guild member who returned to work after striking for several weeks.
She said union members had asked union leadership about the steps necessary to end the strike, and asked to speak with CWA President Chris Shelton or other members of the executive board about his “end game” for the strike.
“No answers ever materialized,” she said.
When asked whether the strike could end if one or more of the union’s demands are met, Tanner said the path ahead was unclear without seeing whether the NLRB order to return to the table and restore the previous contract would be enforced.
“But we're certainly going to be working at the table and working amongst ourselves to see what the path forward looks like,” he said.
Pound, the striking digital editor, said it’s hard for him to fault some of his non-striking colleagues, especially those who started working only recently at the Post-Gazette before the strike began.
“They literally [show] up in Pittsburgh, go to their first newspaper job, and — boom — there is a strike,” he said. “There's suddenly a whole lot of indecision, a lot of fear about how this is going to go, and so they stayed.”
But for him, going back before their demands are met is not an option, even as he feels the financial squeeze of striking. Pound said the union is working on different ways to make the strike sustainable, however long it takes.
If they don’t, he said he will find ways to make it sustainable. Pound said, if he has to, he could begin making deliveries for apps such as UberEats to make ends meet.
“I won't cross the picket line,” he said. “I just won’t do it.”
