The Cap Times: Wisconsin Watch journalists form union, joining national trend

From The Cap Times, published Oct. 23, 2023: 

Employees at the Madison-based nonprofit newsroom Wisconsin Watch announced Monday that they have formed a union, part of a growing movement to organize the nation’s struggling journalism industry. 

The Wisconsin Watch Union, which will represent around 10 nonmanagerial staffers, fellows and interns from both the editorial and business sides of the organization, informed management Monday that 80% of eligible employees have signed cards to affiliate with The NewsGuild-CWA, the largest news industry union in the country.

The union asked CEO George Stanley and the organization's board of directors to voluntarily recognize their union.

Wisconsin Watch investigative reporter Phoebe Petrovic, who has covered statewide issues like misconduct by prosecutors and proposed legislation on transgender youth, said that she and her colleagues, who are currently at-will employees, want more job security.

“We're going to get into specifics at the bargaining table once we’re recognized, but … this started for us when we were sort of looking at our handbooks realizing that none of us have contracts,” Petrovic said, explaining that as at-will employees, they can be “fired at any time.”

“The only way to lock in sustaining changes and to create an avenue where we can raise concern safely and be heard is establishing a union that can work on these things going forward,” Petrovic said.

In an email to the Cap Times after this story published, Stanley said that he and the board have reviewed the request. “Once we work through some details, we will discuss voluntary recognition with the group,” Stanley said in the Tuesday email.

“We also share their desire to build a strong, sustainable newsroom in which journalists can accomplish the most rewarding public service work of their careers — reporting that improves lives,” Stanley said. “As a locally owned nonprofit, Wisconsin Watch is in a unique position to encourage a collaborative network that fills holes in community coverage created by the loss of revenue and journalists at the state's commercial news organizations, nearly all of which are owned by distant chains.

“Everyone at Wisconsin Watch wants to build it into an even stronger provider of high-impact, truth-seeking news in the years ahead.”

A time of transition

It's no coincidence, she said, that the announcement comes just one week after the first leadership change in the nonprofit’s 14-year history. Founders Andy and Dee Hall announced their retirement in June, and Stanley became CEO last week. 

“We all love Wisconsin Watch, but we're moving into this new era with Dee and Andy leaving, new leadership … and this seems like kind of the right time to do it,” Petrovic said.

The Halls, a married couple who previously worked at the Wisconsin State Journal, began the nonprofit in the basement of their Fitchburg home in 2009, with the goal of producing the type of investigative stories that were becoming increasingly uncommon as struggling newsrooms cut staff. Founded early in would become a wave of news nonprofits, the outlet would share its stories for other outlets to republish for free. 

Shortly thereafter, the Halls moved Wisconsin Watch into the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Vilas Hall, where for years they had just a handful of staff and a rotating crew of student reporters, who wrote hundreds of stories.

Today, Wisconsin Watch has two dozen employees, a $2 million budget and hundreds of national, regional and state awards, according to its website. 

“For nearly 15 years, Wisconsin Watch has delivered the long-form, thorough investigative reporting our state needs,” the union said in a statement distributed throughout the newsroom Monday. “Our commitment to serving the people of Wisconsin through award-winning journalism remains unwavering.”

Workers expressed support for the organization’s mission of “increasing the quality, quantity and understanding of investigative journalism in Wisconsin to foster an informed citizenry and strengthen democracy.”

“We make Wisconsin Watch. To best fulfill that duty and live the organization’s values, the rank-and-file workers across business and editorial must play a greater role in decision-making about the structural, strategic and financial future of Wisconsin Watch.”

Investigative reporter Jacob Resneck, who has recently reported on money in Wisconsin politics and the rising cost of living for the state’s workers, said he and his colleagues believe unionizing will “make our organization more resilient in years to come.”

“Forming a union is the tried-and-true way to inject democracy into your workplace. That's why my colleagues and I have come together to lead by example.”

Newsroom unionize nationwide

In a press release, the union said its campaign comes amid “an upsurge in successful organizing drives in newsrooms across the country.” In a September blog post, NewsGuild president Jon Schleuss said the national union had added more than 1,100 members over the last year, including at powerhouse investigative news nonprofit ProPublica, which voluntarily recognized its employees’ union in August.

“We're asking to be taken in stead with all these other incredible organizations that have done incredible journalism with a unionized workforce,” Petrovic said.

Meanwhile, news outlets are struggling to find new funding models, as the internet has decimated the advertising revenue news outlets long relied on. Many news outlets have laid off workers, and some journalists have seen their workplaces transform with the changing news landscape.

Wisconsin Watch’s new CEO has led a unionized newsroom before. From 2015 to 2022, Stanley was editor of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, whose union predates the 1995 merger of the Milwaukee Journal and the Milwaukee Sentinel. 

“The business model that supported independent news gathering and reporting for more than a century has faltered,” Stanley said in a Wisconsin Watch article announcing his hire. 

“People need to be well informed, at the local, state and national levels, for self-government to work. We need to come together — community groups and civic leaders, for-profit and nonprofit news outlets, foundations and philanthropists — to help rebuild a healthy ecosystem for meeting our news and information needs.”

Neither Stanley nor board chair Brant Houston immediately responded to a request for comment.

Editor’s note: Reporter Natalie Yahr worked as a student intern for Wisconsin Watch from September 2018 to May 2019.