WTTW technicians to lose group health care insurance as strike against public TV station enters its third week [Chicago Tribune]

As the strike by two dozen WTTW technicians enters its third week, negotiations are at a stalemate over a new labor contract, and the pressure is mounting on both sides.

On Monday, the Chicago public TV station notified the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1220, which represents the striking workers, that it will terminate group health insurance coverage for the technicians as of April 1. The workers will have the option to continue coverage — at their own expense — through the federal COBRA program.

“One of the guys on the picket line actively has cancer, and a couple of guys have had cancer in the past,” said John Rizzo, business manager for Downers Grove-based IBEW Local 1220. “Removing that coverage and putting the cost burden back on these people with no paychecks to help support it, it’s quite frankly an evil move on their part.”

In an email, WTTW said when the workers went on strike March 16, they “moved to inactive employment status,” with health insurance covered through the month of March. The station told the striking employees last week they automatically qualify to continue coverage under the COBRA health insurance program.

“Health insurance coverage is reliant on employment status on the first day of each month,” Julia Maish, a WTTW spokeswoman, said in an email Tuesday. “The company presumes that the IBEW addressed health insurance coverage optionality with its striking members before their strike action.”

The striking IBEW workers include camera operators, graphic artists and floor crew responsible for various productions at WTTW, including the station’s signature nightly news program, “Chicago Tonight.” The employees went on strike after a year of negotiations failed to produce an agreement on a new labor contract with WTTW-Ch. 11. It is the first such strike in the 67-year-history of the Chicago public TV station.

WTTW has continued to produce a downsized version of “Chicago Tonight” during the strike, with executive producer Jay Smith and other management personnel handling the technical aspects of the 7 p.m. live broadcast. The show has been reduced from an hour to less than 30 minutes on most nights, and the guest list has been winnowed by a growing list of politicians who refuse to cross the picket line.

Last week, Mayor Lori Lightfoot appeared at a union rally in front of the station’s North Side studios, while Gov. J.B. Pritzker issued a statement Thursday, setting a top-down tone for dealing with WTTW during the strike.

“Until WTTW-Channel 11 can come to an agreement on a fair contract, I stand in solidarity with the men and women of IBEW Local 1220 and will honor their strike,” Pritzker said.

The Democratic Party of Illinois sent a letter last week to Sandra Cordova Micek, president and CEO of Window to the World Communications, parent of WTTW-Ch. 11, saying it also stood in solidarity with the striking workers, and had notified political candidates that appearing on the station would be considered crossing a picket line.

“While some politicians have declined invitations for interviews, Chicago Tonight remains committed to providing news reporting, context, and analysis to our viewers about the news of the day,” Maish said.

The technicians had been working without a labor contract since July, when a one-year extension of the previous four-year agreement expired. The issues are job protection and work jurisdiction, according to the union, which alleges WTTW is trying to farm out their long-standing technical duties to news producers and nonunion personnel.

WTTW said it offered the union a no-layoff guarantee and a bargaining unit minimum of 25 full-time employees for the term of the new contract, but the IBEW rejected it. The station “stands ready to return to good faith negotiations as soon as possible,” Maish said.

Cameramen and editors start at $20 an hour, with a top pay of $48.41 after seven years, according to the IBEW. Floor crew start at $18.19 per hour with a top pay of $38.22, while graphic artists start at $19.39 and max out at $29.89 per hour after seven years.

Rizzo said while seasoned veterans can make a good living, the starting pay is so low that it’s hard to attract new technicians to work at WTTW.

“This is not the way that public television should be run. It should be run with people in mind, not corporate profits,” Rizzo said. “The top scale is a nice living wage and the bottom scale, they can’t get people in on. You can’t feed a family at that rate.”

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