You come around this Big Bang universe often, sweetheart?

The new One Big Bang Web site is looking good, judging from a preview I got to see over the weekend. There's a regularly updated and expanding section with people's pics and tales, and much more. Anyway, chime in if you want to make suggestions about the Web site (or that I should never be allowed near the English language when innocent people are exposed).

For now here's a link to California Media Workers Guild President Michael Cabanatuan's recent blog post - New Year, New Guild - as food for thought (he's a super nice guy -- just thought I'd throw that in there. But, really, just read his post and you'll see what I'm talking about).

I'm gonna have to get a job as a carnaval barker soon if I don't stop.

SF Weekly cover story on One Big BANG campaign!

What do you think of this article? The comments are starting to flow over at the SF Weekly ...

Leave a comment below for the ol' water cooler...

Ask what your union can do for you

From the SF Weekly cover story about the One Big BANG campaign:

"Veteran Hayward Daily Review reporter Karen Holzmeister became an ANG union devotee in 2002. Editors asked Holzmeister, who had worked for the newspaper since 1973, to write an increasing amount of stories, following budget cuts. In addition to her normal Hayward beat, she was asked to report on two unincorporated areas and regional elections. Finally, Holzmeister says, she collapsed in her doctor's office from work fatigue. She took two weeks of accumulated sick leave; when she returned, her editor had demoted her to the Castro Valley beat, which was typically reserved for rookie reporters.

Holzmeister, who describes herself as a "happy employee" for most of her career, was shocked. She was considering hiring a lawyer when Tribune reporters and union officers Josh Richman and Robert Gammon (the latter of whom is now with the East Bay Express) showed up at her door to offer the guild's help. "I couldn't understand why I was being treated this way after I had dedicated my professional life to the company," she says. "Frankly, had the guild not offered to help me, I would have no recourse whatsoever."

New campaign website launch...January!

Stay tuned here for the new One Big BANG website launch in just a couple weeks.

Got suggestions for features to include?

Knowing your rights, Part 1 of 3

Here's a little quiz. Rate yourself on how much you know about your right to organize a union in your workplace.

You have the legal right to:

1. Attend meetings to discuss forming a union with co-workers. T/F?

2. Read, distribute and discuss union literature, as long as you do this in non-work areas and during non-work times—such as in the break room at lunch. T/F?

3. Wear union items on the job, such as buttons, stickers, t-shirts. T/F?

4. Sign a card asking your employer to recognize and bargain with your union. T/F?

5. Sign petitions or file grievances related to job issues. T/F?

6. Ask other employees to support the union, to sign union cards or petitions, or to file grievances. T/F?

Editor’s Note: The above info is based on a summary of your union organizing rights prepared by the St. Louis Newspaper Guild.

ANSWERS: 1-6 are all TRUE. Any retribution by your employer for the above activities are grounds for legal action.

What good is that ole' union, anyway?

Some of our management friends at The Creek seem to be spreading a little dish about the Guild - after always first acknowledging that, of course, we have a right to organize and unionize. (They most assuredly know that our growing organizing drive is bolstered by both the law and the stats: MediaNews employs more Guild-represented workers than any other U.S. publisher.)

But apparently their PR consultant's talking points encourage them to say that in all their years they haven't seen a union that did a bit of good. Then it comes - wait for it - "you know, like the old ANG union."

Uh huh. Just tell that to everyone of us who finally gained regular pay raises and grievance procedures after years under MNG, solely because of the perseverance of the ANG union.

And how many non-Guild newsworkers got the kind of package Jonathan Jones did when layoffs came? An ANG reporter with The Argus, he took a Guild-negotiated deal during the first round of post-consolidation layoffs (btw, layoffs that MNG management assured us wouldn't happen). Jonathan was finally able to take off for the foreign correspondent career he'd always wanted and was in Uganda last I heard. The ANG union cushioned the blow for a bunch of us. It would have been a lot uglier otherwise, a full hatchet job.

Look, we know firsthand you're on your own at MNG without a contract: they'll pay you what they want and fire you when they want - no if's, and's or but's.

And if we're so useless, why is management going out of their way to do all sorts of (costly) things they never bothered with before? You notice all the attention we're getting since they started feeling the heat of the union drive. Can you just imagine what it will be like once we have a BANG union in place? Holy Moly. No wonder management is fighting us.

Mythbuster #1

Word is that Guild negotiators at our MNG sister paper, The Monterey Herald, are making headway in hammering out a new contract -- one that isn't stripped down like a junkyard car.

Mythbuster #1: MediaNews can be brought to the table and held accountable by organized workers. That's "workers" - plural - as in all of us, and "organized", as in union.

If it can be done in Monterey, St. Paul and Denver, it definitely can be done by the 300 of us here in the East Bay.

That's right: we can stand up for what we believe and negotiate terms of our day-to-day work, instead of just swallowing whatever the company chooses to give us. Don't we deserve a say in our future?