Jax Times-Union Staffers Rally for Better Pay

Screen grab from Jax4TV

Employees at the Florida Times-Union spoke out Friday about their pay and cuts in newsroom staff which they said impacts all local news.

According to JAX4TV you normally don’t see reporters and others that work in the Florida Times-Union, which is owned by Gannett, in front of cameras. That changed Friday when they held a rally near Jacksonville City Hall. The employees who attended said the reason they are speaking out is pay and what they say is the lack of pay raises.

Everyone at the rally Friday is a member of the Times-Union Guild, part of the Communications Workers of America Union (CWA). Times-Union reporter David Bauerlein spoke for the group.

“We’re asking for Gannett to support local journalism, to invest in our newsroom and invest in the local journalists who are doing the work. That means paying journalists who have been faced with year-after-year increases in the cost of living, no wage increases in 2018, it makes it much harder for us to get by to do the job we love and continue doing the job we’d love,” Bauerlein said.

Bauerlein said in 2019 the newsroom had 63 employees. Now that number is down to 22. Those left are now fighting for a fair contract.

Al Tompkins, who is retiring from the Poynter Institute, a journalistic research center, said newspapers are not alone. All forms of local media, including broadcast stations like News4JAX, are undergoing changes.

“Unfortunately, newspapers, in most cases, waited way too long to start thinking about transitioning into something new. And so they cut staff in order to try to, you know, keep their margins up and keep their people employed. And they did that at the expense of enterprise,” Tompkins said.