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Hello everyone,

Here’s a news release we sent out today. This is, indeed, great news for the Guild, and represents the first unit we’ve organized in more than a decade. Janet

ST. PAUL, MN: A majority of employees at TakeAction Minnesota overwhelmingly decided last week to organize as a new unit of the Minnesota Newspaper & Communications Guild, TNG-CWA Local 37002.

TakeAction, a progressive group dedicated to racial and economic equality, joins current Guild members in Minnesota at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the St. Paul Pioneer Press, Clean Water Action, interpreters at Hennepin County Medical Center, and others.

“We are delighted to welcome TakeAction employees to our union,” said Janet Moore, president of the Minnesota Guild. “As smart and dedicated folks, they’re an incredible fit with our organization.”

More than two dozen TakeAction employees signed cards under a neutrality agreement with their employer to join the Guild, a sector of the Communications Workers of America (CWA). The Minnesota Guild formed in 1933 and is the second-oldest TNG Local in the country with about 630 members. All told, 32 members will join the Guild.

“For more than 80 years, Guild journalists have been speaking truth to power, and that tradition will continue with the addition of our Local’s newest members,” Moore said.

“TakeAction has long stood with the labor movement and now we stand as a part of it,” said Terin Mayer, a TakeAction employee who worked diligently on the organizing campaign. “This shows that as a progressive organization, we walk the walk.”

Dan McGrath, executive director of TakeAction Minnesota, said, “We congratulate our staff on choosing the Newspaper Guild as their exclusive representative for collective bargaining. As a people’s organization committed to making Minnesota more equitable and democratic, we fervently believe in the right of all workers to organize and bargain collectively. Our staff is no exception. We appreciate the respectful and professional manner in which our staff conducted their organizing work, and we look forward to bargaining a first contract in the same spirit.”

Retired labor leader Bill Moore served as the neutral third-party arbitrator in the card check.

(Photos above: Left, President Janet Moore and TAMN internal organizer, Terin Mayer; Right: Some of our new TAMN members.)