Chicago Sun-Times columnist Mark Brown has seen a lot of characters walk in and out of the dumpy 47-year-old newsroom at 401 N. Wabash Ave.
There was the day in 1984, Brown recalls, when tabloid king Rupert Murdoch strode in and announced that he owned the paper.
Within months Brown watched a parade of key staffers, including Mike Royko, head for the exits. Friday all 185 Sun-Times staffers will be filing out for the last time.
They are moving to nicer space several blocks west near the Merchandise Mart to make way for a skyscraper to be built by Donald Trump. Still, Friday will be an emotional day at the Sun-Times.
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And the first week in the new digs isn’t expected to be any less dramatic.
Two key bargaining sessions are scheduled between the Chicago Newspaper Guild and management. If no contract is reached by Thursday, the union will most likely set a strike date for sometime in October.
With the sides far apart, there is much anger and anxiety in these talks, perhaps more than ever before.
Staffers feel they were pickpocketed by former Publisher David Radler and former Sun-Times parent company Chief Executive Conrad Black, the latest in a string of cost-cutting owners going back to Murdoch.
Before the last contract, Radler cried poor. In response, the union settled for one year without a raise, then 1 percent and 1.25 percent raises the next two years.
But a special committee of the Hollinger International Inc. board filed a report Aug. 31 claiming that Black and Radler skimmed 95 percent of the profits over seven years, or nearly $400 million.
To many staffers, the report only added to their anger and frustration.
“There are a lot of people who say, `Let’s just go now,”‘ said Bob Mutter, co-chairman of the Guild at the Sun-Times. “We could, but it would hurt the paper. It would hurt us.”
History at the Sun-Times suggests that the staff, which has dwindled by 70 people since 1994, will get to the edge. It’s not unusual for staffers to put on their coats as if they are about to walk out, only to stay at their desks until a deal is reached.
This time the union is asking for a 7.5 percent wage increase in the first year and 5 percent in the next two years, down from the 9 percent it originally sought for the first year.
Management is now offering 2 percent increases the first two years and a 1.5 percent lift in the third year.
“The movement has been minimal and glacial,” Mutter said of management’s stance.
In addition, much of the goodwill that former co-editor John Cruickshank gained in taking over as publisher seems to have evaporated.
A big “Dear John” sign is posted in the newsroom, plastered with scathing letters to Cruickshank and management. The sign is expected to make the move to the new space, Guild members say.
Sun-Times executives say they’re also carrying the impact of other contracts to the new newsroom. They have negotiated 2 percent increases with some of the paper’s other unions, so they believe that offering anything sweeter to the Guild would set up the company for more labor problems.
“We are far apart, but we’re going to make every effort to get there,” said Ted Rilea, head of labor relations at the Sun-Times. “We want to reach a fair settlement with them, but we can’t go and won’t go [to 7.5 percent].”
When asked if Sun-Times management has contacted reporters at the Daily Southtown or its other papers to cross the picket line if need be, Rilea said: “We’d bring in who we need to get it done.”
Meanwhile, Brown remains optimistic that talks will work out, he said as he headed back into the office Thursday to finish packing up 22 years worth of work and memories.
But at the same time, Brown, a member of the Guild, said he is prepared to walk if the union opts to strike.
The Guild isn’t the only thing management at the paper has to contend with. It also is in talks with the Sun-Times’ Teamsters truck drivers, whose contract is up Dec. 15.
Sun-Times’ plan to advertisers: The Sun-Times has said it will make good on its promise to compensate advertisers for overstating its circulation dating back to 1996. But in a letter to advertisers, John Cruickshank, publisher of the Sun-Times and head of parent company Hollinger International Inc.’s Chicago Group, is being less than accommodating to those who were duped. He says advertisers will be compensated only back through 2001.
Tough luck trying to get money for the four years before then that the Sun-Times was also fudging the numbers. “We have chosen 2001 as the compensation starting point in order to expedite restitution, and because prior to then the average overstatement was approximately one percent,” Cruickshank wrote.
Advertisers aren’t given much of a choice in how to be compensated either. Cruickshank informed advertisers that 70 percent of the settlements would be in cash. The rest will be made up through “value-added options for future programs,” much of which will be through make-good ads.
And if you expected to get an even return for the circulation going back to 2001, advertisers might be out of luck. “We have been advised that there is not a one-to-one relationship between circulation and advertising rates,” Cruickshank wrote. “Other factors such as the level and growth of other advertising rates in the market play a strong role.”
Sources say that the Sun-Times is using a sliding scale in order to compensate advertisers. And that scale is less than the percentage of the company’s circulation that was overstated. For example, in the last year of the circulation scam, the Sun-Times overstated its circulation by 50,000 papers, or roughly 10 percent. Yet it’s only offering a rebate of roughly 6 percent for that year, sources said.
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A Hollinger spokeswoman wouldn’t comment beyond the letter.
Quick hits: After 43 years in the public relations business, Herbert Rozoff is closing his firm of the same name Oct. 31. … The Chicago Magazine Association renames its annual Vanguard Awards the Bill Harmon Awards, in honor of the Starcom USA/Leo Burnett media director who retired this year after 50 years. Receiving awards this year are Tom Bell, vice president/group director at OMD; Brenda Schieffert-Wise, consumer print strategist at Best Buy; and Brenda White, media director at Starcom. The luncheon will be held Oct. 18 at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel & Towers.
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Contract details
Who’s covered: 185 reporters, copy editors and other news staffers.
What the union wants: A 7.5 percent raise the first year, which began Oct. 1; raises of 5 percent for each of the next two years.
What the company has offered: A 2 percent raise the first year, 2 percent in the second year and 1.5 percent for the contract’s final year.
Next steps: Union negotiators will meet with company representatives Tuesday and Wednesday.
Union members will meet Thursday and possibly set a strike date.