BY MITCHEL ROSENBERG
NEW YORK - ABC Television ended its 74-day lockout of 2,700
hourly workers, members of the National Association of
Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET) January 15.
The TV network, owned by the Walt Disney Co., still has a concession contract on the table that workers discussed in meetings organized in December. They will vote on it by mail by February 7. Officials of NABET Local 16 in New York are proposing to reject the company's package, according to Jim Joyce, mobilization coordinator and a member of the local's executive board.
NABET, which is part of the Communication Workers of America, also represents ABC workers in Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington, DC., including members at local TV and radio affiliates. About half of the workers are in New York, with nearly 1,000 at the national network center.
The lockout began November 3 in response to a one-day protest strike the previous day by NABET members over ABC's refusal to provide details of the new health package it sought to impose on workers. This is information union members had "repeatedly asked for...to no avail," according to NABET leaflets distributed from the picket lines. The same literature explained, "We continue to pursue an Unfair Labor Practice charge through the National Labor Relations Board." The union went to court during the lockout to contend the company's attack was illegal.
The day before Thanksgiving, ABC canceled health insurance covering NABET workers and their families.
During the lockout, ABC hired freelance audio, video, and graphics production workers to join management as scabs. Workers on the picket lines pointed out numerous weaknesses in the quality of broadcasts while they were out. Many of the same freelancers are among the up to 45 percent of the workforce ABC seeks to hire as temporary, part-time workers under their proposed contract, to erode the union shop. Some workers look forward to the challenge of recruiting them to the union's side.
Many NABET members, like Marty Domacasse, a master control network engineer with 19 years at ABC, speculate the company ended the lockout out of concern over losing credibility of its news coverage of the impeachment of U.S. president William Jefferson Clinton, since many Democratic politicians have refused to be interviewed by ABC during the lockout. Domacasse also pointed to the media giant's effort to introduce new hosts on its morning program, "Good Morning America," and the negative impact the lockout would have as it sought to pretty up its image. Finally, Domacasse said, "the company saw the union as stronger" as it fought through the lockout, reaching out for and receiving solidarity from unionists and others - "more friends on the picket lines" than in previous actions. NABET members are upbeat about returning to work, with the fight around the contract still ahead.
Mitchel Rosenberg is a member of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees in New York.