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I’m told that tonight’s SAG Hollywood Division meeting began with an advisory motion presented by George Coe asking the SAG National Board to immediately send out the AMPTP’s February 18th “Last, Best And Final” offer to the membership for a vote. Coe, a Hollywood Division board member and Membership First’er and part of the ousted TV/Theatrical negotiating committee, reminded SAG National Executive Director David White that, according to federal labor law, the union only has 60 days from the date that the offer was presented to respond, or the AMPTP can unilaterally impose the LB&FO. White was asked to immediately call a SAG National Board meeting to discuss sending the contract out for a membership vote.
“What happened next had jaws dropping all over the room,” a source told me. “It was clear from David White’s response that he intends to let the clock run out without calling any SAG National Board meeting or sending out the contract. He said SAG had to be ‘strategic’ about this and wanted to make sure the Commercial negotiations were going well before proceeding. That made the MF [Membership First] members go ballistic.”
Those Commercial talks are currently in recess for a week. When told about the urgency of getting the AMPTP LB&FO in the members’ hands for a vote, White responded, “This is not something to do when you’re distracted by the other contract… We’ll have to assess when to have a meeting … I’ve spoken to many members who don’t want us to send out the contract for a vote.”
Unite For Strength leader Ned Vaughn also was dead-set against setting the LB&FO out to members: “If we send this contract out, and it’s accepted, that goes against what the Board wants… The reason [MF] wants to send the contract out for a vote is to get the members to vote against it so a Strike Authorization Vote will follow… Since 75% of the [SAG] National Board rejected the contract, who will write the ‘pro’ statement?” (For those of you who need a scorecard, Unite For Strength is part of the SAG National Majority coalition running the Guild now along with all but one member of the NY Division and the entire Regional Branches.)
I’m told Vaughn’s comment prompted another Hollywood Division Board member, Membership First’s Anne DeSalvo, to respond, “If we don’t stand for something, we’ll fall for anything.”
In the end, Coe’s proposal was passed because of the Hollywood Division support of Membership First (even though the Unite For Strength contingent voted no). But this is just an advisory motion to the SAG National Board, so it doesn’t have much in the way of muscle to force the new leadership to let membership have any say on the contract.
The question I have to ask again is, Exactly what is it that the SAG National Majority will do? If White truly does nothing, and the AMPTP is allowed by federal labor law to unilaterally impose that LB&FO on SAG, then the membership will never get to have their say on the terms of the new contract one way or the other. That would be inexcusable.
To date, the SAG National Majority has never tried to improve the terms of the AMPTP’s LB&FO once it was presented February 18th — except to debate its expiration date. Obviously the new leadership feels that this contract, a retread of AFTRA’s lousy contract, is good enough though even the new NED White told the SAG National Board it “sucked” and it undermines vital issues like residuals and jurisdiction in New Media. The SAG National Majority’s goal in the past was to attack the old Guild leadership at every turn. Its goal in the future is a AFTRA/SAG merger at any cost. As for any plan for the present, it’s obvious that the SAG National Majority still doesn’t have one.
But the AMPTP does. I always wondered how the SAG National Majority was planning to get the proposed TV/Theatrical Contract ratified by the membership. But I never thought it would be by doing nothing.
- SAG Board Today Votes To Reject AMPTP “Last Best Final” Offer
- SAG National Majority Has No Clue What To Do Next
- AMPTP Gives SAG “Last Best Final” Offer And Blows Off New Negotiators: Deja Vu
- Why The Smoke & Mirrors, SAG & AMPTP?
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SAG is toast. Them changing their leadership was the dumbest thing they could have done. AFTRA didn’t fuck the actors that hard.
They deserve the mediocrity.
OMFG… Wish I could say I was surprised. UFS never intended to let anyone vote on anything. And now they will roll over and play dead, letting the “final offer” become the de facto contract.
Wish someone could sue over this and force the vote. SAG is screwed, and they have only the “moderates” to blame for it.
Thankfully, the advisory motion has been passed. Now put it into action immediately so we can vote before it’s too late! I demand my right to vote.
Whoa.
If that isn’t a plot twist…
With respect, Nikki, it is possible you are incorrect in stating that the SAG national majority has no plan.
U4S & allies – AKA the corporate appeasers – had really only one problem with the LBF – the three-year timetable. However, they must know, based on the overwhelming results of the postcard poll, that the membership would reject the LBF. They can’t publicly support the LBF, because it contradicts all their protestations about aligning with the WGA and so on in two years. But privately, they must want it because they’re angling to allow it to go into effect the only way they can – by sitting on their hands. Any statements about not wanting to adversely affect the commercial contract negotiations are just so much noise.
That is, in short, their plan – to implement an onerous union-busting residual-stealing reverse-Robin-Hood contract through inaction. At this point, the corporate appeasers’ refusal to put anything to a vote of the membership – the LBF or the SAV – is clearly anti-democratic. It is also downright shameful.
I’m confused. Was White hired by SAG or the AMPTP?
Also, is there absolutly no way for the SAG membership to kick the new leadership out?
One question. If the AMPTP companies are currently paying out on the old contract at lower rates, and that contract doesn’t provide any jurisdiction to SAG for new media or any type of residuals for new media, and since SAG can still strike at any time during the term of a unilaterally imposed LB&F offer, what is the motivation of the companies to impose it? Just because they want to pay SAG scale actors more? Why wouldn’t they just keep operating under the old contract at the lower rates?
The problem with SAG is that it’s run by actors. Having worked with actors, most of them are emotional and narcissistic wrecks who came to Hollywood looking for something they couldn’t get at home as children. The result is a union run by ego and megalomaniacal maniacs, the wealthiest and most powerful of whom tried to convince the poorest members that they didn’t need their residuals or livelihood because it would have interfered with the 20 million plus salaries of Matt Damon and Tom Hanks. That’s the real crux of the truth. The stars didn’t want to be bothered and now the union in such perilous straights that I, quite frankly, predict it will not survive. And you know what, frankly they deserve it.
This fiasco has gone from Shakespearean tragedy to Becketian absurd. These “corporate appeasers” (who for the most part I noticed have tv jobs they want to keep driving to everyday), are sitting around like vladimir and estragon, not daring to go anywhere, because Godot might show up. But the leopard don’t change his spots, the dog can’t be taught new tricks, godot will never show, and the corporation exists to steal your bone and fuck you up the ass.
“If we send this contract out, and it’s accepted, that goes against what the ***Board*** wants” –Ned Vaughn
When oh when will the new SAG board ‘majority’ finally get it through their thick skulls that as directors they are supposed to represent ***ALL*** the members of SAG? Not the members that can hire people and negotiate their way out of a bad standard deal, not their friends who are too scared to stand up for their futures and/or potentially ‘mess up’ their popularity with the executives in the conglomerates thereby hurting their current deals.
Being a board member in a labor union means you take on a *fiduciary* duty. That for those who didn’t go to law school means that you act in trust for your fellow members and when you make decisions on their contracts you actually have to put the entire membership’s contractual interests ahead of your own and, well, dare I say it, FIRST?
Don’t believe me? Go read some US Supreme Court cases on something called the “duty of fair representation”. There’s an amusing little one called Marquez v. Screen Actors Guild.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/search/display.html?terms=collective%20and%20bargaining&url=/supct/html/97-1056.ZS.html
Note the following: “A breach of a Union’s duty of fair representation occurs when a union’s conduct toward a[ny] member of the bargaining unit is arbitrary, discriminatory, or in bad faith. E.g., Vaca v. Sipes, 386 U.S. 171, 190.”
Methinks the ‘new’ SAG board majority & NED White along with SAG itself needs to get ready for a suit in federal court (which any SAG member can bring).
It’s a sad day when a Union talks of ratifying a labour contract without seeking the approval of it’s members.
… Is this what the RBD, NY and U4S membership at large wants? I ask because this isn’t what the U4S’s ran on in the election. Wasn’t their platform in a nut shell; We want everthing MF wants but we think that they are blowing the negotiations?…
Can somebody PLEASE post on here, how, as SAG members, we can take collective action? How can we start a movement to force them to send out the contract for vote? Also, if it is turned down, what mechanism can we use to start a movement to remove new board members that we do not approve of? Are we all just going to sit around and watch this happen? Do we NOT have ANY power?
MATT MULHERN: – if you are reading this – how can we get something moving here? Everybody comes here on this board and comments – but we never get anything going. How can we mobilize. How can we collectively start a movement to remove people like Ned Vaughn who have, by anybody’s opinion I have talked to, committed the equivalent of treason against their union?
Somebody – anybody who “knows” – please post here, and there are people, like myself, who are willing to do the footwork.
I have been able to make a living as a middle class actor for over 12 years now. It’s hard to believe that I’m going to have to wait tables again. But the cold, hard truth is staring me in the face. I heard this “new technology” argument in the commercial world with cable. And now to see most of the commercials I book air only on cable…. We are doomed. They have bested us. Well, as a parting shot I’d like to tell the studios and the producers, “Good luck finding true talent out there! We’ll all be too busy with our other jobs to come to your stupid audition that won’t pay anyway!”
Yeah, I’m reading it. It isn’t surprising to me, at least. The “moderates” want merger with AFTRA, that’s their goal, and, as shocked as they were by the failure to grant retro-activity when they lat met with the AMPTP, their inner-discussions have consisted of figuring out, with David Whit, whom they hired for just this reason, to parlay this seeming disaster into their ultimate goal – merger with AFTRA.
So, this, while still quite a volatile situation for them, is heading, generally speaking, in the right direction.
MF screams bloody murder at meetings, and knows it is essentially powerless to do anything. Any influence they had, the blew, when they didn’t send out the SAV back when they had the chance.
That inaction led to the boiling over of frustration and anger that led to the UFS coup.
And here we are.
I know this is all observation and not solution, but when I read Scott Wilson draws 150 people to demonstrations, and there are 70 thousand SAG members in L.A. – I wonder: where’s the beef?
People, outside the boardroom, where they accomplish nothing except yelling at each other, seem perfectly willing to ride the wave wherever it takes us: merger with AFTRA, out of the ability to make a living, both?
My main focus has been, and will continue to be, transparency , electronic voting and electronic polling. That’s a longer-term idea, but it still requires membership participation, because it would require the membership, watch listen, then vote ALL these knuckleheads out on their asses, and install some people who know what the fuck they are doing.
Otherwise? Right now? Revolt. Imagine, as John Lennon used to warble, if thousands upon thousands of SAG members descended upon 5757 Wilshire and demanded action? THAT would get some attention, don’t you think?
Ned Vaughn is happy as a clam. This is all going just as he hoped. And his puppet-master in NYC, Richard Masur, as well as James Cromwell who said publicly “the plan is to weaken SAG enough to merge with AFTRA?”
They appear to be getting their wish.
You want a plan? You are not going to get anywhere via parliamentary rules. You will have to revolt. You will have to get people off their asses and go down to 5757 and get in their faces and tell them you want them out. And you will have to do it “peacefully” or risk getting arrested.
That’s about it. right now UFS has all the toys. And MF has nobody to blame but themselves for giving them away.
If you want to stop this farce of “union representation”, you must do what Scuttlebut suggests… Sue in federal court over the union breaching their fiduciary duty. That’s what has to happen. Perhaps you can get the ACLU to help out here. Or another unions lawyers (like the AFL-CIO).
That is probably your only hope.
This is one big bad joke.
Yes, please. How can we kick these people out of office and/or get that contract sent out before the 60 days? Petition, how many signatures would we need? Some sort of emergency action? Also I want White out, we aren’t paying him 400,000 (why are we paying that much at all?) to NOT actually negotiate anything, but to allow employers to lay a contract on us.
You know, I’ve had order by tv companies include a letter in with something I ordered saying they were signing me up for an offer and if I didn’t respond before the free trial was over, they would charge me a monthly fee. I called them up and told them sending me a piece of paper doesn’t constitute us entering into a contract – I never agreed to that, they need me to sign off for that to be a contract. I got my money back. Why does this feel like that? And why does it seem like we have less opportunity to address these wrongs?
I don’t know the rules, but someone who is a lawyer or who has a history or is on the Hollywood board must…
They are going to ignore the “advisory” – so lets not put any of our eggs in that basket. What can we do NOW to end this ridiculousness?
For all those asking what they can do…
Its quite simple actually. The upcoming board elections later this year – Vote. There is no petition or lawsuit that would have any effect before the elections (or probably ever – the elections will always carry more legal authority than anything else).
(the membership will be heard loud and clear – one way or the other – just not sure it will be the outcome you want)
Ancient Chinese proverb: If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will lead you there.
WE WILL SEE THEM IN COURT.AND, MAYBE THE STUDIOS TOO.
It’s time to mobilize folks. These people hijacked our union–your union. They are on the move to reduce your salary and eliminate your ability to make the minimums for insurance for your children. All the more spoils for them.
Their platform has always been to keep a contract vote out of the hands of the membership. They were clever enough and have weekly salaries high enough to hire clandestine legal reps to advise them on a way to overthrow our leadership and those same legal advisers are clever enough to overthrow us–the membership–to get what they want.
If we sit by and do nothing more than post our dismay we can only blame ourselves for letting the demise of our union and our ability to make a living.
On a very basic level they are paying $400,000 of our dollars to have White sit on hands while they still pay Doug Allen $500,000. That’s about $1 million of our hard-earned dues to move forward their agenda to eliminate us by eliminating our vote.
The cards of UFS and David White are easy to see. From here on out, DO SOMETHING, or blame yourself.
I’m with Scott. It is time for the working class members of SAG to get our union back. When working on sets, I have yet to meet a SAG actor who wouldn’t vote No on this contract. Can we really wait until our next elections to do something?
Too bad Budd Schulberg & Elia Kazan aren’t here anymore.
They could make a hell of a movie about this! But, unfortunately there isn’t anyone in this Guild with the guts of Terry Malloy!
To Scott of March 10th 6:30am;
Although it has been mentioned on other occasions, any SAG member can go to the Guild and pick up petition instructions. In the SAG constitution, I believe Article X, any action made by the national board can be challenged/reverse by the membership. It takes collecting the signatures of 10% of the general membership (at least 10-12 thousand signatures of paid up members). That’s also the process to remove a board member. Or board members can be brought up on charges. Those charges are filed with the Secretary/Treasurer, investigated with the results being presented to a smaller committee which then presents its ruling to the board. I believe it takes a 2/3rd vote of the national board to remove a board member. That’s also in the constitution.
Obviously the easiest way to try to correct some of this nightmare is not to re-elect any UFS Hollywood board member this coming September. I believe Vaughn’s seat is up. That may not help with the current situation, but…
I want to thank Nikki for her take on the current situation. I,too, couldn’t figure out why UFS voted against sending out the LBF and what their plan could possibly be. I believe Nikki nailed it. That is UFS/NY/RBD’s plan; To not do anything, let the 60 days elapse and that would allow the AMPTP to force that piece of crap deal on SAG. With or without any change in “term”. But that doesn’t prevent SAG from still voting. From what I know and what I’ve read, the AMPTP promulgating a contract does not prohibit SAG from sending out that contract to the membership. Or a SAV. So, what we have to do now is demand that the SAG send the LBF out to us ASAP. And keep demanding that until that happens. Demand, demand, demand. Call, send emails, go to the SAG offices in New York, L.A. , everywhere. Get the word out. Talk it up while waiting to audition.
If you believe that UFS/NY/RBD have really screwed things up by constantly sabotaging, publicly criticizing and belittling the former negotiators, damaging the union by the freaking Written Assent, lied to the membership by “promising” that the new team can get a better deal ASAP, replaced a real fighter (Doug Allen) with someone who’s never really stood strong against our employers (McGuire) and who have constantly bent over backwards to protect AFTRA and the AMPTP, let them know, too. The members have the power to try to fix this. It’ll take a lot of elbow grease, but it can be done. It’s not too late.