CBS News faces its own writers strike

As Hollywood braces for its television and film writers to go on strike as soon as Monday, more than 500 CBS News employees represented by the Writers Guild of America under a separate agreement with that network are contemplating their own job action.

The CBS television and radio staffers -- a group that includes news writers, editors, desk assistants, production assistants, graphic artists, promotion writers and researchers who work at a local or network level in New York, Washington, Chicago and Los Angeles -- plan to vote Nov. 15 on authorizing a strike.

Union leaders say they expect the employees, who have been working without a contract since April 2005, will back a work stoppage.

“My expectation is we are going to have an overwhelmingly high strike authorization vote, and I hope CBS will take it as a final signal that they need to come back to the table with a fair and equitable offer,” said Ann Toback, assistant executive director of the WGA, East.

Contract discussions with CBS have been at a standstill since November 2006, when 99% of the employees voted to reject the network’s last offer. The last meeting between the two sides was held Jan. 8.

“We gave them a fair and final offer nearly a year ago, which they urged their members to reject,” a CBS spokesman said. “This offer remains on the table.”

The Writers Guild called the contract offered by the network unacceptable, saying it would mandate lower wages for radio employees than for television and network news staffers, as well as allow CBS to combine union and nonunion newsrooms. The guild is also seeking a 13% raise over 4 1/2 years, noting that its members last received a raise in April 2004.

If the news writers went on strike, programs such as “CBS Evening News” would experience “an immediate diminishment of quality,” Toback said.

But even if the membership authorized a strike, it remained unclear whether the guild would immediately call for one.

The threat of a CBS news writer strike underscores the complicated patchwork of union membership in the television news industry. Some news writers belong to the Writers Guild while other employees are part of the National Assn. of Broadcast Employees and Technicians, which negotiates its own labor agreements with each network. Meanwhile, a large share of network news staffers -- including many producers -- have no union representation.

Complicating matters further, a handful of veteran writer-producers who work for network newsmagazines such as “60 Minutes” and “Primetime” are represented by the Writers Guild when it comes to their writing functions. In the case of an industrywide strike, the guild expects them to refrain from performing their writing duties.

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matea.gold@latimes.com