SAG TELLS MEMBERS STRIKE VOTE IMMINENT

In a curiously delayed email message to members of the Screen Actors Guild, union President Alan Rosenberg and National Executive Director Doug Allen said that on October 1 the union's negotiating committee had asked the national board of directors to send a strike authorization referendum to members when it meets in Los Angeles on October 18 and 19. "Although the national negotiating committee is empowered to authorize such a referendum, the committee felt that the national board should be the body to debate and decide this important issue at this time." Critics of the union leadership have suggested that the move is a ploy by the Membership First "hardliners" to test the resolve of the Unite for Strength faction to support their demands for new media jurisdiction and payments. Analysts have suggested that even if a strike authorization vote is approved by the required 75 percent of the voting membership, the earliest a strike could be called would be early January.

10/10/2008