Front page of El Diario via their site.

A round of layoffs hit the El Diario newsroom last Friday, with conflicting numbers being reported by different news sources. Early on Monday, Capital New York announced that 12 employees had been fired, but later in the day Crain’s New York Business posted that the number was 20. However, all sources agree that eight of the employees were members of the Newspaper Guild of New York (confirmed by the Guild itself on their site), and that the layoffs do appear to be part of a longer conflict with the union.

In her article for Capital, Nicole Levy reported that the layoffs came three months after the Newspaper Guild “filed an unfair labor practice charge against ImpreMedia, El Diario’s parent company, for allegedly threatening to fire employees over their loyalty to the union at an editorial meeting in February.” During the meeting in question, Content Director Juan Varela had made “disparaging comments about the Guild and its contract with the newspaper” and “said a majority of editorial staff members would not have jobs in six months,” according to the union (quoted in March 7 article by Levy on the problems at the paper).

The divisions were tentatively resolved in May, with ImpreMedia agreeing to abide by its contract with the union, and pursue negotiations in the future. But the firing of eight Guild members suggests that ImpreMedia may be honoring that agreement in name only. Some of the fired employees certainly feel that that’s the case. From Levy’s article:

The first staffer to collect her discharge notice, former metro reporter Rosa Margarita Murphy, had worked at the paper for over 13 years. In an email to Capital she said that since February the company had been “looking for ways to get rid of us, unionized employees, harassing and belittling our work in front of our peers.”

“ImpreMedia has followed through on its illegal threat to fire veteran journalists and try to replace them with nonunion staff,” Guild president Bill O’Meara said in a statement issued to Capital.

ImpreMedia is, in fact, currently hiring in New York: on their jobs board, they’ve got postings up for two Digital Reporters, one Op-Ed Editor, and one Senior Digital Editor. And the levels of experience they’re requiring are relatively limited: 3+ years only for the Digital Reporter positions.

Of course, those listings also indicate that the paper is turning its focus towards its digital presence. Which is probably a good thing. Though the vast majority of El Diario’s ad revenue comes from the print edition (around 90%, according to Matthew Flamm in this other Crain’s article), average circulation of the paper has dropped 13% this year, while the number of visitors to their website has doubled and, again according to Flamm’s article, digital ad revenue is up. Both the site and the paper have been re-designed recently; the new design of the paper, with more graphics, full-color printing, sports coverage, and other shifts and tweaks was just unveiled the week before last.

But it’s possible to go boldly into the new digital future without cutting union members who are experienced journalists out of the picture — it’s not a zero-sum game. The New York Times did it way back in 1995, when Times Digital became the first unionized newspaper website, through the Newspaper Guild. (The Guild’s history of tangling with the Sulzbergers also makes for grab-your-popcorn-and-Big-Gulp reading.) El Diario could start by improving their communication with the union’s representatives at the paper, who were blindsided by the announcement. One of them is Oscar Hernandez, an account executive in the advertising department, and head of the Guild’s unit at El Diario: 

“I’m the chairperson up there and I had no notice at all… There’s a whole laundry list of things they have to do before they can do an involuntary layoff like this,” he said, including seeing if there were any volunteers. We believe this is retaliation against the people who are involved with union activity.”