RECORD COURIER STAFF FILES TO UNIONIZE

 

Unionization bid at Record Courier

The staff of the Kent-Ravenna Record Courier, probably the best small newspaper in the 5-county area forever, formally filed to unionize into the American Newpaper Guild.

Pay at the RC is so low that Gannett found it financially unwise to furlough them because they paid them LESS to work there than they would pay to lay them off the way Gannett has done to journalists across America.

The RC staff filed union authorization cards with the National Labor Relations Board.

It asked Gannett to voluntarily recognize the union to save time, effort and money.

Kaitlyn McGarvey

Bob Gaetjens

Diane Smith

Jeff Saunders

Jonah Rosenblum

Allen Moff

Lisa Scalfaro

Signed the notification to Gannett’s Michael Shearer, the Beacon Journal’s editor and Gannett’s regional editor, whose web site describes himself as “respected community leader and Rotarian.” 

If he were a Rastafarian instead of a Rotarian then Shearer could channel Bob Marley and adopt brotherhood, oppose oppression and seek redemption by recognizing the RC union.

It would be sweeter than RC Cola if Gannett would take its knee off the neck of its Record-Courier newsroom.

Gannett shipped 485 business-side jobs to India this year. After a tsunami of furloughs in 2020.

But the Record-Courier journalists are paid so little that it wasn’t worth Gannett’s paperwork to furlough them.

Garrett is listed among the worst companies in America to work for. In today’s environment that’s an extremely low bar to slither under.

The Record-Courier was a successful and respected Dix family entity until 2017. Then the inhumanity took hold.

The Record-Courier was born as the Ohio Star in 1830. In 1854 it merged with the Home Companion and Whig to become the Portage County Democrat, then was renamed in 1868 the bipolar Portage County Republican Democrat to reflect its pro-Union stance during the Civil War when it, ironically considering today’s situation, opposed slavery and slave wages.

In 1882 the paper bought the Portage County Republican and became the Ravenna Republican. Starting in 1928 it continued its serial name-changing till, in 1961, it became the Record-Courier.

Whew! A rose by any other name smells the same. So does today’s Record-Courier. 

Let’s see if it stinks up Portage County with a union-busting campaign.