'Vindicator' Workers Reject Pact

By: Striking reporters, photographers and truck drivers at The Vindicator overwhelmingly rejected a contract offer Wednesday night that would have ended a more than eight-month walkout at the newspaper.

Members of Newspaper Guild-Communications Workers of America Local 34011 voted 85-17 to turn down the proposal, union vice president Debora Shaulis Flora said. Union leadership did not recommend the contract for approval.

Vindicator general manager Mark Brown said the newspaper will begin hiring permanent replacements Thursday.

Shaulis Flora said the union would continue picketing the newspaper and step up a campaign to pass out fliers at businesses that advertise in the Vindicator, a 70,000 circulation daily that covers northeast Ohio and western Pennsylvania.

Further negotiations have not been scheduled.

At the request of the federal mediator, the Vindicator on Wednesday modified its contract offer to include the union's March 11 wage proposal of 1 1/3 percent pay increases in each of the three years of the contract and bonuses of 1 percent in the first and second years, Brown said.

Shaulis Flora said the proposal was rejected because the sides remain at odds over contract language regarding the newspaper's ability to lay off workers.

"The layoff language is more important at this point," she said.

The Vindicator previously had offered raises of 1 percent in each of the first two years and 2 percent in the third year of the contract, along with bonuses totaling $600 per employee in the first two years.

The union made a counteroffer Monday that included 2 percent raises in each of the three years and the same bonus package. The newspaper rejected the counteroffer Tuesday.

The strike began Nov. 16 and is the newspaper's first walkout in 40 years. The labor dispute included allegations of vandalism and theft against the union and the newspaper.

Shaulis Flora said the walkout would match the length of the 256-day strike in 1964-65 if it lasts until Friday.

A second union that went on strike, Teamsters Local 473, which represents 24 mailroom employees, ratified a contract in January.

The Vindicator has continued to publish with temporary replacement workers. Striking workers are producing their own newspaper.