Gannett’s many newsrooms, two dozen of which staged a walkout this week, include several in the Philly region
While Gannett owns over 200 news organizations in the U.S., including several in the Philadelphia region, not all of them participated in the walkout this week.
Hundreds of journalists at Gannett, publisher of USA Today and more than 200 local newspapers across the country, walked off the job this week to protest their working conditions and the company’s leadership. Two dozen newsrooms across seven states, including New Jersey, participated.
While it wasn’t a companywide strike, it was the largest work stoppage Gannett has experienced in its history, according to the NewsGuild-CWA, the union that represents about 1,000 Gannett journalists in about 50 bargaining units. The pay and staffing issues the guild raised were relevant to news organizations across the company, regardless of whether they belong to the union.
Some of the walkouts started Monday, and others started or continued on Tuesday. Among those walking out were employees of the Asbury Park Press in New Jersey.
“Despite the work stoppage in some of our markets, there was no disruption to our content or ability to deliver trusted news,” a Gannett spokesperson said in an email to The Inquirer. “Our goal is to preserve journalism and serve our communities across the country as we continue to bargain in good faith to finalize contracts that provide equitable wages and benefits for our valued employees.”
These walkouts are the latest in a string of recent work stoppages by unionized journalists at media organizations of various sizes. It started with a strike by some staff at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette beginning in October, which has gone on for more than seven months. A smaller strike across 14 Gannett newsrooms took place in November.
More than 1,100 staff at the New York Times held a one-day strike in December. Employees at digital news outlet Insider, formerly known as Business Insider, went on strike Friday after their union was unable to reach a collective bargaining agreement with management.
While Gannett has acquired numerous local media organizations in recent years, including some in the Philadelphia region, newsroom staff has been substantially reduced across much of the organization. Gannett owns more than a dozen news organizations in Pennsylvania, nine in New Jersey, and the News Journal in Delaware.
Some of them are longtime holdings, such as the Courier Post in Cherry Hill. Others were acquired more recently through Gannett’s merger with Gatehouse Media in 2019.
Gatehouse’s publications included the Bucks County Courier Times, Doylestown Intelligencer, and Burlington County Times, which Gatehouse had bought just a couple years before from a local owner, Calkins Media. Gatehouse had owned several other Delaware publications that no longer exist.
Why did some Gannett newsrooms stop work?
Journalists at various regional publications joined the strike to protest massive staff cuts in recent years and delays in their union contract negotiations and to demand better pay.
Walkouts on Monday coincided with Gannett’s annual shareholder meeting. The NewsGuild, which owns shares in Gannett, issued a letter to shareholders to vote against reinstating CEO Mike Reed, citing a 70% decline in Gannett’s share price since the Gatehouse merger, which they called “an unmitigated disaster.” Reed was reelected Monday.
The letter listed examples of newsrooms where staff have been cut drastically in the past decade. It also showed how this has reduced the number of local stories in Gannett publications.
The Asbury Park Press, for example, had 36 stories written by local journalists in a typical Wednesday issue in April 2013. The same Wednesday in April 2023 had seven local stories.
“The reduction in newsroom employees means that editors need to make choices about stories to cover,” the letter said. “Inevitably, it means that certain subjects are no longer covered.”
Why didn’t all the newsrooms join the walkout?
While they have the same parent company, employees of the local news organizations do not all have the same contract terms.
Some are unionized, and some are not. Among the union shops, some have a no-strike clause in their contracts, which bars them from participating in this week’s walkout.
Journalists at the News Journal and Delaware Online News are unionized with the NewsGuild, but they have a no-strike clause in their contracts.
In Indianapolis, staff of the Gannett-owned IndyStar found a way to demonstrate their discontent even with the no-strike clause in their contract, by removing their bylines from stories indefinitely.
What newspapers near Philadelphia are owned by Gannett?
Gannett lists the following news organizations and papers in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. Only a few of them participated in the strike that took place this week, and not all of them have unionized staff.
(Organizations with a * are members of the NewsGuild, but not all of these members participated in this week’s walkout.)
Pennsylvania:
Pocono Record, Stroudsburg
Bucks County Courier Times, Levittown
The Intelligencer, Doylestown
Ellwood City Ledger, Ellwood City
Beaver County Times, Bridgewater
The Daily American, Somerset
The Record Herald, Waynesboro*
Tri-County Independent, Honesdale
Erie Times-News, Erie*
York Daily Record, York*
Chambersburg Public Opinion, Chambersburg
Hanover Evening Sun, Hanover
Lebanon Daily News, Lebanon
New Jersey:
The Record, Woodland Park
The New Jersey Herald, Newton*
Burlington County Times, Willingboro
Courier Post, Cherry Hill
Daily Journal, Vineland
Asbury Park Press, Neptune*
Home News Tribune, Middlesex County *
Courier News, Somerville*
Daily Record, Parsippany*
Delaware:
The News Journal, New Castle*