Bargaining Update

The CWA CenturyLink bargaining team has reached a five-year tentative agreement with the company that provides employment security for 11,000 CWA-represented workers in 13 states.

The proposed agreement provides new limitations on CenturyLink's ability to contract out and move call center work outside the footprint, and includes a commitment to return jobs that have been outsourced and offshored. Details are being provided to CWA District 7 members and locals, and a ratification vote will be scheduled.

This proposed agreement covers Legacy Qwest CenturyLink members in these states: Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Minnesota, and Iowa. CenturyLink workers in Montana are represented by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

Some 60 S&P Guild members, many sporting red Guild T-shirts, came to watch their co-workers on the bargaining committee, despite management's best efforts to deter observers from attending. Guild negotiators on Tuesday restated the importance of employment and retirement security. Read more here.

Last Saturday, CWA members and supporters throughout West Virginia rallied outside Frontier Communications headquarters in Charleston, W.Va. The crowd included lots of members of Local 2001 and other CWA locals that are bargaining with Frontier for a new contract. The current agreement covering 1,600 workers expires Aug. 2. UMWA President Cecil Roberts, CWA District 2-13 Vice-President Edward Mooney and District 1 VP Chris Shelton, elected officials and labor leaders from across the state were among the speakers.

Guild bargaining continues at The Washington Post, where workers' contract expired on July 26. The union had offered to extend the contract for two more years, with all terms remaining the same except for pay.

Guild members picketed in front of the Cleveland Plain Dealer Tuesday to send a simple message: The Plain Dealer lied to the Guild during bargaining last year. The very next day, newspaper management eliminated the jobs of about 50 journalists, cutting more than a third of an already depleted newsroom staff. Read more here.

Two months ago, the Chicago Sun-Times fired its entire photography staff. To mark the anniversary, the photojournalists protested outside the newspaper headquarters Tuesday morning holding enlargements of their photographs. "While our reporters are doing the best they can to take photos with their iPhones and still trying to deliver quality stories, visually, the story has taken a big hit," Beth Kramer of the Chicago Newspaper Guild told ABC7 News.

IUE-CWA Local 81021's Avis-Budget Negotiating Committee reached a tentative five-year agreement with the AB Group (Logan/Headquarters) and Avis (Downtown/Cambridge). The tentative agreement provides annual wage increases and improvements in wage progression at both companies, among other gains. The union bargaining committee voted unanimously to recommend the proposed contract; a ratification vote is being scheduled.