LABOR UPDATES
New Job Cuts at Baltimore Sun Could Cause ‘Irreparable Damage’: Baltimore Sun workers are facing another round of job cuts less than five months after 100 jobs were slashed in July (Sun Workers Protest Job Cuts 7/21/08 UC), reported the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild last week. "We have pleaded with the company not to cut any more jobs for fear that the newspaper will sustain irreparable damage,” said Angie Kuhl, Guild Unit Chair at the Sun. “We have argued that cutting more employees is not a successful strategy: Every business owner knows that you can’t make money and grow by cutting staff." The latest cuts – expected to be announced soon by the Chicago-based Tribune Company, which owns the Sun – will likely be felt throughout the company, including the newsroom. And unlike the last round of cuts, workers will be laid off without being offered buyouts. "Tribune's dangerous business strategy has saddled the newspaper with billions of dollars in debt and now employees in Baltimore are bearing the brunt of these decisions,” said WBNG Executive Director Cet Parks. Since the Tribune Company took over the Sun in 2000, the newspaper’s workforce represented by the Guild has shrunk by more than 50 percent. “The Baltimore Sun is still a significant employer, but it is quickly being diminished by a thoughtless group in Chicago who care little about the Baltimore community,” Parks added.

FENTY SLAMMED
FOR CREATING
“HOSTILE”
ENVIRONMENT
Just a few floors below his office, DC Mayor Adrian Fenty was roundly criticized by over a dozen DC residents who testified at Thursday night's DC Workers' Right Board hearing about the “hostile” environment he’s created “through fear and intimidation.” Hundreds of workers and community activists packed the hearing, which explored Fenty’s ongoing attack on public sector workers and its negative effects on the DC community. The hearing included testimony from teachers, parents, students, mental health and social workers, lawyers and labor leaders. Watch the website and UNION CITY Monday for a full report.

WEEKEND LABOR HISTORY
Six miners striking for better working conditions under the IWW banner were killed and many wounded in the Columbine Massacre at Lafayette, CO. Out of this struggle Colorado coal miners gained lasting union contracts (11/21/1927); The United Auto Workers Union strikes 92 General Motors plants in 50 cities to back up worker demands for a 30 percent raise. 200,000 workers are out (11/21/1945); Congress approves the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), to take effect January 1 of the following year (11/21/1993); 20,000 female garment workers are on strike in New York; Judge tells arrested pickets: “You are on strike against God” (11/22/1909); The district president of the American Federation of Labor and two other white men are shot and killed in Bogalusa, AL as they attempt to assist an African-American organizer working to unionize African-American workers at the Great Southern Lumber Company (11/22/1919); History’s first recorded strike, by Egyptians working on public works projects for King Ramses III in the Valley of the Kings. They were protesting having gone 20 days without pay – portions of grain – and put their tools down. Exact date estimated, described as within “the sixth month of the 29th year” of Ramses’ reign in “The Spirit of Ancient Egypt,” by Ana Ruiz (11/23/1170BC); Troops were dispatched to Cripple Creek, CO to control rioting by striking coal miners (11/23/1903); Mine Workers President John L. Lewis walks away from the American Federation of Labor to lead the newly-formed Committee for Industrial Organization. The CIO and the unions created under its banner organized six million industrial workers over the following decade (11/23/1935); More info & ammo for unionists is available online from Union Communication Services.