Meeting of the New York Broadcast Trades Council (NYBTC)

The May 24, 2010 meeting of the New York Broadcast Trades Council (NYBTC) was held at the office of IBEW Local 1212.

At the May 24Th meeting, representatives of NYBTC member unions:
   *    IBEW local 1212   *   IATSE Local 794
   *    NABET-CWA Local 11    *    NABET-CWA Local 16    *   
met with Congressman Anthony Weiner (D. N.Y. 6Th).

Congressman Weiner has shown great concern over the use of Local News Service (LNS) crews to reduce the number of ENG crews in markets across the country. Congressman Weiner was very interested in hearing the concerns of the NYBTC member unions on the effect of this consolidation of electronic news gathering on employment for our members. He also expressed his concern regarding the reduction in the diversity of news available to the public caused by LNS.

The NYBTC will be working with Congressman Weiner on this important public policy issue. IBEW local 1212 agreed to have attorney Michael Bosso supply the Congressman with supporting information needed to raise concerns about shared services agreements, LNS, and media consolidation as diversity and public policy issues not only with Congress, but also with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and the Department of Justice (DOJ).

LNS started in January 2009 in the Philadelphia market with NBC and Fox sharing ENG crews in an expansion of

...The stations simply laid off the vast majority of their ENG crews

"pool" coverage. The concept of LNS was to have each participating station in a market porvide an ENG crew. a central LNS assignment editor would send each crew out to a different press conference or event and all the stations would share the footage. In other words if five stations each contributed one crew, and each crew covered two stories per shift, each station would get ten stories for the price of two. This would free up the other ENG crews for investigative and feature stories, increasing the quality and diversity of news for each station.

Unfortunately, this is not what happened. In the 20 markets around the country that have embraced LNS, instead of expanding feature stories and doing more investigative journalism, the stations simply laid off the vast majority of their ENG crews. IATSE local 794 reported that at FOX5 in New York, the number of ENG camera operators has been reduced from 17 to 2 as a direct result of LNS. WPIX recently laid off their entire sports department and their last remaining sports reporter, Lolita Lopez, will now rely exclusively on LNS for their sports coverage.

LNS, shared services agreements, and station consolidation, with employers working together in ways that illiminate good union jobs, circumvent FCC oversight, and reduce the number of free, vibrant voices providing information to the public, weakens the public discourse that is essential to keeping democracy strong in our great nation.

NYBTC members present at the May 24, 2010 meeting were

Frank Viskup, ...President, IBEW Local 1212

Ralph Avigliano, ...Business Manager, IBEW Local 1212

Vinny Butler, ...Senior Business Representative, IBEW Local 1212

Tom Cassidy, ...WPIX ENG Shop Steward, IBEW Local 1212

Joe Garufi, ...CBS ENG, IBEW Local 1212

Paul Vasquez, ...President, NABET-CWA Local 16

Larry Worster, ...Grievance Chairman, NABET-CWA Local 11

Matt Ryan, ...WWOR TD, Executive Board Member, IATSE Local 794

Tom Blair, ...FOX5 ENG, IATSE Local 794

Michael Bosso (ESQ), ...attorney for IBEW Local 1212

(l)Rep. Weiner and BM Avigliano

From left to right P. Vasquez, T. Blair, V. Butler, Rep. Weiner, R. Avigliano, B. Daraio, F. Viskup, TC Cassidy