Hartford Courant Reporters Win First Union Contract; People's World Celebrates 100 years

 

After five years of negotiations, reporters at the Hartford Courant and seven other Tribune publications have ratified an historic first union contract with hedge fund owner Alden Global Capital.

Following years of a dwindling newsroom and devastating cuts, newsroom employees voted in February 2019 to join together and form a union.

“When we created The Hartford Courant Guild over five years ago, it was in part to help ensure that the oldest continuously published newspaper in the United States continues to function,” said Christopher Keating, co-chair of the 21 member unit.

The joint bargaining committee, involving 62 NewsGuild members, secured a two-year contract that guarantees raises, a grievance and arbitration process, social media protections, maintaining the 401(k) match, and increased job security.

“Our first union contract at The Hartford Courant is historic,” said Lori Riley, the unit co-chair. “It’s a testament to our determination and grit to foster a workplace that values transparency, fairness, and the pursuit of truth above all else.”

The Hartford Courant and other Tribune publications were sold to the hedge fund Alden Global Capital in 2021.

A Centennial of Working Class Journalism

In contrast, as mainstream media continues to consolidate in the hands of hedge fund managers, the pioneer grassroots People's World is expanding in readership and coverage as it celebrates its 100^th year of working class journalism. Since 1924 the paper, originally named the Daily Worker, has never missed an issue.

“The first front page of the Daily Worker said ‘Big business interests, merchant princes, landlords, and profiteers should fear us,” recalled editor-in-chief John Wojcik.

“We always stand on the side of the struggle of the working class,” said Wojcik, a former meat cutter and UFCW shop steward. “That’s one thing that does not change.”

“One of the strongest weapons the ruling class possesses is its control of the press,” added managing editor C.J. Atkins. “A hundred years ago, a group of radical workers and Marxist writers decided to break that monopoly” and start a paper “based on a truth that could not be found in any of the newspapers at that time.”

It became a tool for the working class, providing “an alternative to capitalism” and campaigning for workers and their causes, organizing against fascism and war, and defending democracy over the decades as it does today.