KOMO 4 on-air staff are set to no longer be represented by their labor union — the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists — after a narrow vote last week.
Anchors and reporters at Sinclair Broadcast Group’s Seattle-area station voted 9-7 last Wednesday to remove their affiliation with SAG-AFTRA, following a decertification petition filed with the National Labor and Relations Board in July. The majority of the bargaining unit’s 22 employees had signed the petition to hold the vote, said Patrick Semmens, the vice president of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, which represented the workers in the case.
The vote is expected to be certified by the NLRB this week, barring objections from SAG-AFTRA. SAG-AFTRA national declined to comment. The union’s Seattle chapter did not respond to requests for comment as of Wednesday.
KOMO employees and management did not comment on the record about the decision to leave the union. The workers had consulted with the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, using its free legal assistance to file the petition last month, Semmens said.
Semmens declined to disclose the specific reasons why KOMO reporters and anchors submitted the petition, but said oftentimes workers who file decertification cases are concerned about underutilizing and not getting enough value from their union. For example, SAG-AFTRA does not set the pay scale for KOMO’s bargaining unit beyond a minimum salary of about $66,000 — lower than the minimum pay offered in prior job postings for reporters — and staff members often negotiate their contracts with the employer individually, according to Semmens and a reporter at KOMO who was not authorized to speak publicly about the case. SAG-AFTRA members also pay an annual base fee of $246.14, with work dues deducted at 1.575% from their paycheck, according to the union’s website.
“We've seen other people suggest that the union really didn't do much for them,” Semmens said. “There was not a lot of good communication, so basically, they've got forced dues … and I think that led them to reconsider whether keeping the union around was in their best interest.”
Last Wednesday’s vote took place at KOMO headquarters on Fourth Avenue North, with 16 out of 22 eligible voters casting ballots.
KOMO anchors and reporters previously held a decertification vote in 2019, but the majority voted in favor of SAG-AFTRA. Over the years, the union has provided leadership training, support for its local broadcast steering committee and seminars for Seattle TV stations, with national staff visiting KOMO in 2015, according to a SAG-AFTRA blog post.
“Seattle is an important market for SAG-AFTRA for many reasons,” said Karen O’Leary, the 2015 Seattle local chapter vice president in a post that year. “We are an important media market, with three organized TV stations, three radio stations and a traffic reporter unit, and a total of nine collective bargaining agreements.”
Thirteen photographers at the station, who are affiliated with the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, also filed a petition to leave their union in May.
Correction: This story originally included Stephanie Juarez, listed on the case as additional legal service with SAG-AFTRA, as declining to comment. Juarez is actually a human resources manager at KOMO.
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