This e-mail just went out to Seattle Times employees. It's from Alayne Fardella, Senior Vice President for Business Operations for The Seattle Times Company, and it provides yet another sign of the punishing financial situation the Times is currently facing:

Date: February 4, 2009

To: All Seattle Times Employees

From: Alayne Fardella

Re: Labor Update

I want to let you know about an important step we are taking to help respond to our ongoing financial challenges.

Yesterday, we held a meeting with the administrative officers and business agents of the 11 bargaining units representing affiliated employees of The Seattle Times. The purpose of this meeting was to provide them with a deeper understanding of what the company is facing, what we are doing in order to sustain the organization, and to ask for the participation of our affiliated employees in getting us through these hard times. Frank Blethen and Carolyn Kelly along with several members of SOC spoke candidly about our current circumstances.

The overarching message was one of survival. We are doing everything we can to get through this economic tsunami. To do so, we need significant contributions from all of our employees, both affiliated and unaffiliated. The union leadership clearly understands our situation and expressed willingness to help us work through these next difficult years. We are appreciative of their support, your support and that of our community. We will also be seeking help and support from our lenders.

The e-mail goes on to ask for a 12-percent reduction in payroll and benefits expenses from every unionized employee group, but it doesn't dictate how this reduction will (or should) be achieved. It's not hard to figure out the likely possibilities, though: fewer employees, furloughs for the current employees, or reductions in work hours. The rest of the e-mail is in the jump.

Recently, unaffiliated employees participated in the pension accrual freeze and the furlough program. When those announcements were made in December, we indicated that we would be asking affiliated employees to also contribute. Today’s meeting was the beginning of that process.

We are asking that each employee group contribute savings equal to approximately 12% of their payroll and benefits expense. Given the demands of our daily commitment to readers and advertisers, and the wide variety of functions we perform, the way in which each group achieves this target will vary.

The urgency of the situation we are facing requires us to seek these concessions now rather than waiting for a new round of contract negotiations. We simply cannot afford to delay.

The challenges at hand, and the need for swift action, come as no surprise to anyone. We are hopeful that the contributions we began discussing yesterday will help stave off more severe measures, but there are no guarantees.

While these are difficult times, it is important to remember that challenging financial circumstances are not unique to The Seattle Times. Each day brings a new story about one of our newspaper industry colleagues, not to mention the daily reports of layoffs happening locally and nationally in the broader economy.

Next Steps

We understand union representatives may want to more closely examine our financial statements. If so, we provided each business agent with a copy of our standard confidentiality agreement to sign.

We are working to schedule meetings with the unions over the next weeks because we need to move forward swiftly.

Together, we share common goals — the preservation of jobs and the survival of The Seattle Times into the future. These are tough times to be sure - but we are tough people and I know we can all work together to sustain our organization through these difficult days.

I will continue to provide periodic updates. At any time, please do not hesitate to contact your manager, department head, Martin Hammond or me with questions.