District 2-13 Bargaining News: March 2024

Altice

The Local 2002 and 2007 Bargaining Team met with Altice throughout March and reported that little progress had been made. The Bargaining Team encourages the membership to reach out to Local representatives for mobilization activities. 

The contract with Altice in WV expires on April 25, 2024.

American Red Cross

Negotiations over the National Addendum with American Red Cross are being scheduled. As reported in Local 13000 Jan/Feb newsletter:

Despite the December 31, 2024, contract expiration date, an agreement was made with the Company to enter into early bargaining. As a result, bargaining surveys have already been sent out and received back by the membership to ensure our bargaining committee’s agenda is set and identifies those priorities identified by the membership. While no concrete bargaining dates have been set with the Company at the time this article was written, the anticipated time frame for the opening of bargaining is in the early April time frame. Updates on bargaining will be relayed to the membership as events unfold.

Climate Reality

Negotiations with Climate Reality continued through March. Compensation remains the top priority, as well as issues in the workplace. Check out the latest bargaining report.

The Climate Reality Project joined CWA last spring when they signed a Voluntary Recognition Agreement. The bargaining unit is represented by CWA Local 2336, and this contract will be the members’ first.


Comcast

Alle-Kiske

After nearly a year of bargaining, the Union Bargaining Committee reached a tentative agreement with Comcast over the Alle-Kiske bargaining unit. The tentative agreement includes:

• Individual salary adjustments
• Yearly General Wage Increases (GWIs)
• Improved wage progression for new hires
• Increased flexibility in the Summer Overtime Plan
• $500.00 ratification bonus
• And much more…

Check out the full report for more details.

On March 21, the Bargaining Unit ratified their agreement. Congratulations to the Bargaining Team and members!

South Hills

One day after the Alle-Kiske TA was announced, the Bargaining Team reached a tentative agreement on the South Hills contract. If ratified, the new contract will include: 

• Signing bonus/Individual Wage Adjustments/Annual Wage Increases
• Elimination of Made to Stay
• Improved Holiday/Inclement Weather/Job Security Language
• Better Summer Overtime Plan conditions
• And more

Read the full report.

On March 27, the Bargaining Unit ratified their agreement. We congratulate the Bargaining Committee and members!

FastMail

The Union Bargaining Committee opened negotiations with Fastmail over the members’ first contract on March 18th. Check out the first report.

Negotiations are scheduled to resume in April. 

Fastmail was organized in February when the PA-based employees voted to be represented by CWA Local 13000.

Mission Wired

Negotiations with Mission Wired continued through March. The Bargaining Committee appreciates members’ input about their contract priorities. Check out the latest bargaining report.

Mission Wired employees joined CWA in September. The bargaining unit is represented by CWA Local 2336, and this contract will be the first for the bargaining unit.

 

Newtown Township – Firefighters 

On March 7, CWA reported:

CWA Local 13000 firefighters, serving both Newtown Township and Newtown Borough, secured a three-year contract extension. Under the new contract, firefighters will adopt a seven-day, 12-hour shift schedule. Additionally, existing firefighters are set to receive a three percent pay increase above their 2024 salaries, and two lieutenant positions will be created. The addition of new personnel increases the department’s full-time, career firefighting team to 12 members. The firefighters work closely with local volunteer firefighters.

CWA Local 13000 represents the Township's municipal workers, too.

Piedmont

The Piedmont Bargaining Committee reported that talks with the airline were meaningful this month. Please reach out to your Union Representative to find out how to show your support for the Bargaining Team!

Read the full report.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

This month, CWA launched a campaign to support striking Pittsburgh Post-Gazette workers.

Members in Locals 14827, 14842 and TNG-CWA Local 38061 have been on strike at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette for over 500 days, which makes it the longest-running strike in the United States.

Please continue your support of striking workers at the Gazette. Visit cwa.org/ppg and subscribe to the strike paper at unionprogress.com.

UPO

The CWA Local 2336 Bargaining Committee met with the United Planning Organization this month to negotiate a fair contract for members. Check out the most recent news from the bargaining table.

Last year, the Bargaining Team and UPO agreed to extend the contract expiration date to March 31, 2024.

Zenimax

In Local 2108’s March Newsletter, Zenimax Quality Assurance Tester, Autumn Mitchell, reported on the status of Zenimax negotiations:

Since April 2023, we have been in negotiations with Microsoft and ZeniMax to secure our first contract. Our bargaining team consists of former CWA Local 2108 President Marilyn Irwin, Jeff Lacher (CWA Staff Representative), Dylan Burton (Senior QA Tester - TX), Page Branson (Senior QA Tester - MD), Rhyanna Eichner (Lead QA Tester - MD), Zach Lyon (Senior II QA Tester - MD), Wayne Dayberry (Senior QA Tester – MD), Autumn Mitchell (QA Tester – MD), Conor O’Donnell (QA Tester – MD), and Jessee Leese (Contract QA Tester – MD). 

Bargaining has been productive, and we hope to complete our negotiations soon. We are fighting for higher wages and transparent pay structures. We want to see an end to people performing job responsibilities above their title without compensation. We are exploring improvements to professional development opportunities. Many of us work remotely or hybrid, and we want to secure that flexibility. We have also already secured strong language surrounding AI and automation, which threatens jobs in all industries. You can read more about that here: https://cwa-union.org/news/releases/zenimax-workers-united-cwa-collective-bargaining-yields-first-its-kind-tentative 

What we want to accomplish: 

Historically, jobs in the video game industry are exploitative of workers; our wages are far less than those of our peers in other industries under the same job titles, we are often expected to suddenly work exhaustive overtime until our games are ready to launch, and because we are at the corner of tech and art, we suffer all of the negatives that come with worker for big tech, and all of the passion tax for loving immersive art. 

We believe we deserve to have a voice at our jobs, and with unionized jobs in games, we can help reshape how our industry works, and how it treats its workers.

Who we are: 

We are comprised of roughly 375 workers of the Quality Assurance (QA) department at a well-known video game company, ZeniMax, and we are members of the ZeniMax Workers United of the Com-munication Workers of America (ZWU-CWA). 

ZeniMax Media, Inc. is the umbrella company that publishes video game titles from studios like id, Arkane Austin, ZeniMax Online Stu-dio, Bethesda Game Studio, and others. You may be familiar with some of our games like DOOM, Quake, Elder Scrolls Online, Prey, Dishonored, Skyrim, or Fallout, among many, many more. We have QA workers in several locations across the country, including Hunt Valley, MD, Rockville, MD, Dallas, TX, and Austin, TX. 

ZeniMax is a subsidiary of Microsoft, as of 2021, and operates as a limited-integration entity, meaning Microsoft is largely hands-off when it comes to our day-to-day operations. 

More about ZeniMax here: https://www.zenimax.com/en