By Adam Pagnucco.
The content staff at WAMU has announced on Twitter that they are forming a union. Their petition to management is reprinted below.
WAMU Union
We, the undersigned WAMU employees, have come together to form our union.
As public media professionals, we are committed not just to reporting the news and creating entertaining and enriching content, but to building and serving a community that trusts us and values the work we do. Our audience expects transparency and integrity from us as content staff. We are committed to meeting that high standard.
At WAMU, we are grappling with deeply ingrained internal racism, high turnover among women of color, disparities in compensation, a reliance on temporary staff who lack job security, and allegations of sexual harassment by a former staff member. Indeed, we have exposed some of these issues in our reporting and in internal discussions that have resulted in positive actions. We are organizing to ensure that our colleagues are compensated fairly and transparently for all the hours they work. We must honor our mission statement to be a respected and trusted voice by eliminating these injustices and inequalities. Together we seek to establish an inclusive workplace that our audience will enthusiastically support for years to come.
We know that as a union, with a seat at the table with management, we can work to ensure that all employees – especially those who have historically endured systemic oppression – feel empowered, valued and safe where they work.
We are proud to unite as a community and form our union.
We therefore choose SAG-AFTRA as our union for the purposes of collectively negotiating our pay, benefits and working conditions.
We request that you recognize this petition as a demonstration that SAG-AFTRA represents a majority of employees in a unit appropriate for collective bargaining, and that you meet and confer with us in good faith to begin the collective bargaining process.