2 Philadelphia Papers Halted by Strike

The city’s two daily newspapers halted publication early Saturday when members of nine unions went on strike in a contract dispute.

To fill the void, television stations planned expanded news shows and special strike coverage while newsstands scrambled to satisfy readers by importing suburban and out-of-town papers.

Picket lines formed at 12:01 a.m. Saturday at the plant that prints the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Daily News. The nine unions represent 4,774 employees, who had been working under the old contract for seven days while talks continued.

“There are no meetings this weekend. I don’t know when there will be any. There’s no reason to call any meetings,” federal mediator Robert Kyler said. “Every issue on the table is economic.”

The strike killed publication of the Inquirer’s Sunday edition, which has a circulation of 1 million. Only 15,000 copies of Saturday morning’s Inquirer were printed when the presses stopped. The dawn press run of the afternoon Daily News, which has a circulation of 280,000 but does not print on Sunday, never began.

Informal talks were held between 2 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. without resolution between Philadelphia Newspapers Inc., owner of the two papers, and the Council of Newspaper Unions, which represents mailers, pressmen, drivers, machinists, photoengravers, clerks, secretaries, advertising and circulation personnel, reporters and some editors and columnists.

Management offered a package that would raise salaries and benefits 17% over three years, but the unions demanded boosts worth 38%, said William Broom, spokesman for the Knight-Ridder subsidiary.