The WNET Group in New York City and members of the Writers Guild of America East have ratified a new two-year collective bargaining agreement.
The 10-member bargaining unit consists of writers, producers and production assistants of promotional material for WNET productions, including American Masters. The employees also work on pledge drives and fundraising.
The new contract includes a pay raise in 2024 to match nonunion employees. “Per diem” employees, sometimes called “permalancers,” will receive a 3% pay raise and bonuses next year.
The bargaining unit also negotiated successfully to include language ensuring that guild members can be assigned digital and creative work.
“We’re so proud that our members at WNET held strong for the contract they needed,” said WGAE President Lisa Takeuchi Cullen in a Thursday news release. “Their dedication persuaded management to drop proposals threatening the unit’s existence, and secured the raises they deserve.”
In a joint statement, representatives from the WNET union said, “We faced challenging negotiations this year with WNET and it took the solidarity of not only our union colleagues at WNET, but the larger WGAE community to pressure management to drop their proposals. We are proud of what we have achieved! WNET members will see improved compensation during the term of this contract and continue to be part of the Writers Guild.”
The WNET Group oversees Thirteen, its flagship New York City station, as well as WLIW in Long Island, N.Y., and NJ PBS in New Jersey. Writers in the bargaining unit work for Thirteen.
In July, the union alleged that WNET management sought to shift the unionized workers’ responsibilities to nonunion employees, a proposal that the bargaining unit characterized as union busting. The WGA East unit said management wanted provisions that would allow its members’ job responsibilities to be passed on to nonunion employees at WLIW and NJ PBS at WNET’s sole discretion.
As part of the new contract, management dropped the proposal. WNET also withdrew another proposal that would have enabled management to replace three-fourths of staff employees with per diem workers.
In addition to contract talks with the promotional writers unit, WNET, along with GBH in Boston and PBS SoCal in Los Angeles, is involved in negotiations with writers guild units representing freelancers who seek to expand the number of workers covered by the agreement. The freelancers have gathered the public support of marquee public media filmmakers such as Stanley Nelson Jr., and voted to authorize a strike if a deal isn’t reached by midnight Thursday.