Members of the Writers Guild of America gathered Wednesday night at the Sheraton Universal Hotel to hear from union leadership about priorities for future studio talks.
On the way, they passed picketing WGA West staffers who had their own problems and had threatened to go on strike ahead of negotiations.
“It’s management’s fault that we have to do this now,” said WGA attorney Dylan Holmes, who co-chairs the union’s bargaining committee. “I think we’ve been dealing with a management team from the beginning that wants to circle the wagons and protect their company.”
The WGA is scheduled to meet with the Motion Picture and Television Producers Alliance on March 16th, and the deadline for a new agreement is May 1st. The employees union, which was organized under the auspices of the Pacific Northwest Employees Union last spring, voted to authorize a strike on Jan. 29.
WGA leadership said that if the staff goes on strike, AMPTP negotiations will proceed as scheduled and key duties will be handled by managers who are not part of the bargaining unit. Asked for comment on Picket, a WGA spokesperson referred to the guild’s previous comments.
WGA West Executive Director Ellen Stutzman is leading discussions with staff. No further negotiation dates are scheduled at this time.
WGA staffer Shelley Guzman, speaking outside the Sheraton Universal, said workers are trying to organize because of the disparity in treatment.
“It no longer feels like a place I love coming to, just because the policies and instructions change depending on the mood of a particular supervisor,” said Guzman, who works as a coordinator for a government agency. “We need uniform equality, a foundation where everyone is treated the same. That’s just not fair. There’s no such thing as equality in the workplace.”
Employee unions have promoted “the cause” and progressive measures for employee discipline.
It also opposes low wages, with 64% of its members earning less than $84,850 a year. For some, a job at WGA can be a stepping stone to a career in the industrial relations department of a major studio. But some are fully committed to the workers’ mission and are frustrated by the lack of a seniority-based pay structure.
“We don’t want to be a crappy starting point for you to get a job at Sony,” Holmes said. “The WGA pays its staff exorbitant salaries. Eventually they realize, “If I pay twice as much as Sony, I can do the same thing and don’t have to work as hard.” This is a big problem for turnover and staff morale. ”
Employee unions have also accused the WGA of violating labor laws. Last summer, the employees’ union filed an unfair labor practice complaint over the firing of organizing committee member Fatima Murrieta. Since then, two more employees who supported the union have been fired.
Negotiations on the initial contract began in September and have continued on and off since then. The staff union accused WGA management of “superficial negotiations” and bad faith negotiations.
Last month, the WGA published a side-by-side comparison of the two countries’ negotiating positions, showing that the two sides are not far apart on some issues. The WGA is pushing for an increase in the minimum annual salary from $43,000 to $55,000, and the employees union is demanding $59,737.
Employee unions have since published their own comparison tables, highlighting major differences on issues such as seniority protection and discipline.
Holmes said he did not expect the negotiations to extend into the AMPTP negotiation period.
“I never imagined we would be so far apart that it felt like we were speaking different languages,” he says.
At Pickett, dozens of WGA staffers were handing out flyers to TV and film writers as they drove into the hotel’s parking lot.
“Our life’s work is to improve working conditions for writers, but many of us struggle to pay rent and work without just cause protection and fear of retaliation in the workplace,” the flyer said.
Holmes said the WGA’s statement against the strike authorization showed a “lack of respect for our work.”
“They are confident that if we go on strike, they can do it alone,” he said. “We feel like they have essentially given up dialogue with us and instead decided to do what a multinational corporation or large hospital chain would do in a situation facing a strike, which is to shut out union members and create a webpage full of false characteristics and portraying their own staff as inherently irrational.”
“This is the tactic Kaiser employed,” he continued. “This is a tactic that Starbucks is employing, and the fact that labor leaders are choosing such a path is disappointing, to say the least.”
