The two sides are trying to reach an agreement on a new contract before June 30, when the unionized Voice employees' current contract will expire, the New York Post reports. "The battle lines have already been drawn, and, not surprisingly, health care is a major focal point," says the Post. Staff writer and shop steward Tom Robbins says that the unionized employees are being asked to join a contributory health plan for the first time. He estimates the plan could cost each employee up to $5,500 per year, and notes that the union has put forth a wage increase proposal, but he isn't sure that will work. "There is no way they are going to give us a pay increase to match that [health care cost increase]," Robbins says. There has been talk that a strike is possible if the contract isn't in place by the end of June, but editor Tony Ortega is hopeful a deal can be reached. "I've been told these things always go to midnight on June 30," he tells the Post. "We value their work and hope to make an amicable settlement."
Veteran Voice staff writer Tom Robbins tells the New York Press that the paper's employees may strike if a contract dispute isn't resolved. Talks center on proposed cuts in health care coverage in the latest contract offer from Village Voice Media, which the union considers unacceptable. "Management is asking for givebacks on our health care policy and on our 401(k)," says Robbins, who serves as a shop steward with United Auto Workers Local 2110, which represents Voice staffers. "We are adamant that there won't be any givebacks here." He says the union has had two meetings with management, but vowed that there would be a walkout if no settlement is reached. "If we don't get it, all bets are off," Robbins warns. The Press says a call to a Voice spokesperson for comment has thus far gone unreturned. The strike is set for July 1 if a contract agreement isn't reached, according to Gawker.
Robbins won in the Continuing Coverage category for newspapers for his story that that questioned key testimony of a star witness against Lindley DeVecchio, a former FBI agent accused of helping the mob commit murder. The story, "Tall Tales of a Mafia Mistress," got Robbins subpoenaed by both the defense and prosecution in the case. Robbins and other winners will be honored at a formal dinner on June 16. A full list of winners can be found on the NY Press Club's site.
We're not sure how big they are, but after 15 years at the Santa Barbara Independent, Tom Morey has left two pairs of shoes to fill. According to a release from the paper, Jen Malkin and Robby Robbins will replace Morey by "dividing the awesome task of sales management." Robbins, who serves on the AAN Board as Classified Advertising Chair, "will concentrate on bringing sales in the door" while Malkin "lords over" production and marketing. And Morey isn't going anywhere: He will remain with the paper as part of the sales management team focusing on the local arts community.
The Voice has finalists in three categories in the annual awards handed out by the Society for Professional Journalists' New York City chapter: Tom Robbins in beat reporting, Rob Harvilla in arts reporting, and Chloe A. Hillard in minority focus, which includes "coverage of a particular minority community, or of an issue with particular impact on such a community, that has import to the community at large." Winners will be announced May 15.
Taking a page from New York Mayor Fiorella LaGuardia, who famously read comics on the radio during the city's 1945 newspaper strike, Olbermann last week read a two-page Tom Tomorrow cartoon from The Village Voice out loud on Countdown. The comic, "Bill O'Reilly's Very Useful Advice for Young People, as Channeled by Vile Left-Wing Smear Merchant Tom Tomorrow," features 16 helpful hints for the "young generation." As far as we know, this is the only time the first-ever recipient of AAN's Molly Ivins Award has had the opportunity to reference his own penis size on air.
Earlier this month, 10-year-old interview tapes that Robbins still had derailed the trial of Lindley DeVecchio, a former FBI agent accused of helping the mob commit murder. With the dust now settled, he talks to the Brooklyn Paper about what it felt like to be on the other side of a news story. "A reporter has got no business being a part of a news story, but sometimes you get dragged in kicking and screaming and that’s what happened here. I had no idea that my tapes were going to be the knockout punch for this case," he says. "I didn't much like being a part of the story, but I didn't know any way out of it either."
As we mentioned yesterday, Tom Robbins' decision to make public the tapes that led to the dismissal of a FBI mob trial was not an easy one for him to make. In today's New York Times, he explains further his decision to break his pledge of confidentiality to star witness Linda Schiro. He tells the Times he came forward, rather than his colleague Jerry Capeci, because Capeci's entire career hinges on writing about the mob. "I don't face the same kind of jeopardy," Robbins says. "Jerry spends his life reporting on people who commit murders. The last thing in the world he wants to do is to be brought to the stand and asked about his sources." Capeci says the pair felt comfortable breaking their pledge of confidentiality since Schiro had broken it herself by testifying. "It wasn't a question of hurting her by violating the confidentiality," he says. "She had already discussed the material that she told us in confidence."
Prosecutors and defense lawyers met yesterday with the Voice's Tom Robbins to listen to his taped interviews that brought into question the testimony of the star witness in the trial of Lindley DeVecchio, a former FBI agent accused of helping the mob commit murder. By the end of the day, prosecutors said the recordings gave them no choice but to drop the case, the New York Times reports. Robbins, who had interviewed Linda Schiro in 1997, says he struggled with the decision to make the tapes available. "Tell me what else I could have done?" Robbins asks the Daily News. "If you sit silent, then someone could go to jail for life. I chose not to live with that." UPDATE: The Voice has digitized the tapes and made the files available online.
Lawyers for both the defense and prosecution subpoenaed Tom Robbins Tuesday night after the Voice published his story that questions key testimony of a star witness against Lindley DeVecchio, a former FBI agent accused of helping the mob commit murder, the Voice reports. Robbins reported to court this morning with his notes and his lawyer. In 1997, he interviewed Linda Schiro, the former companion of Greg "the Grim Reaper" Scarpa. In those interviews, Schiro contradicted testimony she's given in this trial, when she said DeVecchio had a hand in four mob murders. "The story that Linda Schiro told us in three of four of the murders is diametrically opposed to the testimony she is giving in court," Robbins tells the Daily News. "She's lying to somebody."
