KOIN-TV’s videographers, photographers, engineers, directors, and other production staff have always worked hard to get Portland’s news out to television screens across the city. But for the last several years, employees have had to put up with more than grueling overnight shifts and the typical ups and downs of the news industry. 

Since massive media conglomerate Nexstar purchased KOIN in 2016, unionized production staff at the station say they’ve experienced relentless union-busting tactics from their management, leaving them in a years-long battle over their working conditions and general livelihoods. Staff say they’ve been working without a current labor contract since 2017.

KOIN’s off-camera production staff unionized with NABET-CWA Local 51 in 2003. The National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET) is a division of Communications Workers of America (CWA). Staff and union leaders say they were able to negotiate contracts with KOIN’s previous owners, even if the two sides had some disagreements. With Nexstar at the helm, however, things were different. 

Although the cost of living in Portland has increased substantially since 2017, unionized employees at KOIN say they’ve only received one 1.5 percent raise in seven years. Employees have also documented disparaging comments and harassment from management, who have seemed determined to gut support for the union among employees. 

NABET-CWA Local 51 has filed many unfair labor practice complaints and charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) on behalf of the KOIN workers union over the years. But each time the NLRB ruled in favor of the union, Nexstar pushed back. The fight eventually wound up in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which issued a memorandum last month that enforced the NLRB’s findings and ordered Nexstar back to the bargaining table, among other remedies. 

KOIN staff and union leaders were hopeful they’d finally be able to bargain for a new contract after seven years. But in the days after the court decision was made, Nexstar made it clear they have no plans to heed the order. 

The court battle is a culmination of years of turmoil between the KOIN union and station management that began almost immediately after Nexstar purchased the station. 

“I have bargained a lot of contracts with a lot of companies,” Carrie Biggs-Adams, president of NABET-CWA Local 51, tells the Mercury. “I’ve never seen anybody as intransigent as these people.” 

Nexstar didn’t respond to the Mercury’s request for comment. 

With Nexstar unwilling to cooperate with rulings from the NLRB and Ninth Circuit Court, KOIN staff and union leaders are weighing their options. They say their working conditions have impacted the station’s output.  

“A lot of us feel like we're not getting the news out to the community. We’re understaffed, and we're hiring all these people with no experience. Everything is suffering,” Robert Dingwall, a videographer and photographer at KOIN, tells the Mercury. “I don't know if people at home really notice that. I hope they do.” 

“A pattern of disrespect” 

Nexstar is the largest owner of television stations in the United States, with 200 owned or partner stations reaching 220 million people in 116 markets across the country. The company is doing quite well, financially speaking, reporting a net revenue of nearly $5 billion last year. In a financial report published earlier this year, Nexstar CEO Perry A. Sook spoke enthusiastically about the company’s ability to “maximize shareholder returns.” 

Meanwhile, employees at Nexstar stations struggle to pay their bills. According to NABET-CWA, Sook’s current salary is 502 times that of the average worker at the company. 

“There are days where I don’t know how I’m going to pay for groceries without putting everything on my credit card, which isn’t a healthy way to live,” Dingwall says. “Nexstar won’t give us a raise because they’re more interested in their shareholders than they are in their own employees.” 

Dingwall has worked at KOIN since 2010, and says he usually enjoys his job. But things are different than they used to be. 

“I’ve always liked working [at KOIN],” Dingwall says. “You always end up with a lot of camaraderie with people in the newsroom, because you’re around each other so much. Since Nexstar bought us, there's the added twist that everybody is just incredibly frustrated all the time.” 

When the KOIN workers’ contract expired in 2017, the union didn’t expect bargaining for a new agreement would be too difficult. But according to Biggs-Adams, the company came to the table with dozens of major proposals that would effectively gut the existing labor contract. Nexstar wanted to reduce the paid meal period, increase the cost of healthcare, reduce overtime pay, and more. 

Biggs-Adams says the union quickly realized Nexstar was “surface bargaining,” essentially going through the motions of bargaining in order to tire union employees and waste time. This is a bad faith bargaining tactic that constitutes an unfair labor practice under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). 

Throughout this time, employees also reported being mistreated by their management, who told them not to discuss the union or their wages, using implicit threats to revoke wage increases if workers didn’t comply. Dingwall tells the Mercury Nexstar created a culture of fear in the workplace, defying the NLRA in the process many times over. 

“People are afraid to stick their neck out for the union, because they're afraid of retaliation,” Dingwall says. “There's just been this pattern of disrespect, and people are afraid they're going to get in trouble, even though legally we're not supposed to.” 

In early 2020, after several years of failed contract negotiations, Nexstar withdrew recognition of the KOIN workers union. 

Although NABET-CWA Local 51 filed several complaints against Nexstar between 2017 and 2020, it wasn’t until 2021—when the newly-inaugurated President Biden made some key changes at the NLRB—that their cases started to move forward. The NLRB ruled in favor of KOIN workers against Nexstar in 2021, which the company appealed, seeking the full board’s input. 

In July 2022, the entire NLRB issued a lengthy decision against Nexstar, summarizing the company’s anti-union transgressions over the previous several years. The board ordered the company back to the bargaining table, and told Nexstar to reimburse union workers for the earnings they lost while in bargaining. 

The NLRB’s ruling was significant. It hadn’t ordered such a remedy in the 30 years prior. 

“In light of the number and severity of the Respondent’s violations and its recidivist history, the Board agreed with the judge that extraordinary remedies were warranted,” an NLRB summary of the July 2022 decision states. 

But Nexstar appealed that decision too, taking the matter to the federal court, which noted “substantial evidence” of Nexstar’s labor violations. 

Biggs-Adams says attempts to resume bargaining with Nexstar have gotten nowhere. Nexstar told the union it intends to file a motion to rehear the case in the Ninth Circuit. 

In a letter to Nexstar from David Rosenfeld, a union-side labor attorney who works with NABET-CWA, he wrote that the company’s “curt response” demonstrates its “bad faith.” 

 “The Court issued a Memorandum Opinion obviously thinking very little of the Employer’s arguments,” Rosenfeld wrote. “In our view, any effort to delay in bargaining is frivolous and a waste of time…NABET Local 51, looks forward to the day when KOIN resumes negotiations under threat of contempt proceedings.” 

What’s next? 

Dingwall, the videographer, says KOIN employees have considered going on strike, but are daunted by the process, especially as other mobilization efforts, like petitioning advertisers for support, have fallen flat.

Although Nexstar has fought the union at every turn so far, Rosenfeld believes that will change if the company faces criminal charges for refusing to bargain. He expects that if it comes down to the threat of being held in contempt of court, the company will be forced to negotiate. 

“If they don’t comply with that court order and bargain with the union, they can be held in contempt of court,” Rosenfeld tells the Mercury. “By the time they get close to being thrown in jail, they'll probably try to comply.” 

But relying on the legal system has its limitations. It took years for the union’s charges to make their way through the NLRB and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. In the meantime, KOIN union members and leaders have found different tactics to appeal to Nexstar. One such method, employed by Biggs-Adams, has been to purchase shares in the company in hopes of giving the union some extra leverage.  

“I now own enough that I can put in shareholder resolutions and go to the shareholders meeting every year,” Biggs-Adams says. “During the meeting, they have to be civil to me. They give me a minute to talk about how I wish they would come back to the bargaining table and treat their workers better. And then I say, ‘Bye, see you next year.’”