News Media Guild Presses AP Over Labor Grievances

By: Jay DeFoore (Photo District News) The Associated Press may be forced to hire more than 100 new staffers, including three photographers, after letting freelancers exceed the number of hours allowed under its collective bargaining agreement.

The News Media Guild, which represents employees at AP and United Press International, has filed several grievances accusing the wire service of abusing a contract provision that allows it to use so called per diem employees -- temporary workers with no benefits -- on a limited basis.

According to the guild contract, per diem employees were meant to be used "irregularly, sporadically and on an as-needed basis" for no more than 780 hours each in a calendar year. Union President Tony Winton says as many as 102 workers will need their employment status reclassified. If it's determined that they should be granted employee status, Winton says they would be eligible for all the benefits afforded regular employees under the contract, including back pay and vacation time.

"Our objective is to make sure people who work for the company are treated fairly and minimum contract benefits are applied," Winton continues. "If they are in fact workers who should be categorized as part time employees, then they should be entitled to all the benefits of the contract, and no less."

The AP declined to comment on the complaints.

The first and perhaps most significant grievance involves several dozen per diems in AP's sports scores collection center in Spokane, Wash. That grievance is now in arbitration.

Three Boston area freelance photographers -- Michael Dwyer, Lisa Poole, and Winslow Townson -- were named in the most recent grievance.

Dwyer says for the last two years in a row he's accumulated enough hours to exceed the limit for per diem employees. "It was basically a staff job," Dwyer says. "I had the responsibility of a staffer, but with none of the benefits."

Several freelancers believe AP's recent decision to fire Boston bureau Photo Editor Dan Hansen was related to the per diem issue. Hansen, a 20-year veteran of the AP, declined to comment. Other editors said they were under company orders not to talk.

Current and past Boston bureau freelancers say the per diem problems stem at least in part from understaffing. The bureau's four staff photographers are often called away to work national assignments, leaving freelancers to pick up much of the slack.

Dwyer says the per diem workers answered phones, acquired pick-up photos from other sources and processed member requests. The Boston per diems worked regularly scheduled eight-hour shifts, often three or four days a week. Many signed on as per diems, which paid less than what freelancers make, in hopes of landing staff positions that never came.

Dwyer, Poole and Townson have since been offered part-time jobs amounting to 16 hours a week, just above the minimum 15 hour part-time threshold. Acceptance of such a job would not resolve the union's complaint, however. The AP has not given the three photographers any freelance assignments since their names appeared in the grievance, and at least two of the photographers have not yet accepted the AP's offer.

In yet another grievance against AP, the guild has accused the AP of violating contract provisions that govern freelancers' work for other clients. Freelance photographers say AP has strongly discouraged them -- though not expressly forbidden them -- from working for competing wire services such as Reuters, Getty, and AFP.

Winton says work for a competing news agency does not necessarily constitute a conflict of interest.