WESA, WYEP staff vote for union representation
Reporters, editors, hosts, disc jockeys and others at South Side- based Pittsburgh Community Broadcasting Corp. have voted to form a union with the Screen Actors Guild–American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.
The vote was 96% in favor of the union, according to SAG-AFTRA, which has offices in Los Angeles and New York. Pittsburgh Community Broadcasting Corp. is the corporate parent of radio stations 90.5 WESA, 91.3 WYEP and JazzWorks.
WESA and WYEP staff asked management to voluntarily recognize the union
in August. The vote, which was announced Thursday,
will trigger bargaining for the union’s first contract.
“We look forward to beginning WESA’s next chapter with management — even as we work to keep telling the stories that matter to you,” WESA reporter and editor Chris Potter said in a prepared statement. “There were a lot of hotly contested elections taking place this fall. This wasn’t one of them.”
SAG-AFTRA represents about 160,000 content creators in the U.S., including at KDKA-TV, KDKA-AM, WTAE-TV and WPXI-TV. The union is an affiliate of the American Federation of Labor–Congress of Industrial Organizations.