hundreds of workers at Gannett the country's largest newspaper chain staged a one-day strike during the company's shareholder meeting today in New Jersey Gannett owns the Asbury Park Press and North Jersey Media Group among other newspapers across the country the journalists striking today are demanding new leadership and are calling for a vote of no confidence for Gannett CEO Mike Reed who they say has destroyed local newsrooms with misplaced priorities Ted Goldberg is at the strike and has more we made a little bit of Headway on very very small issues but anything even remotely important the company has stonewalled us just time and time and time again it's not often you see a work stoppage stop the Press but that's what's happening for several unionized gannet papers in New Jersey and six other states reporters hope a one-day strike will help them during negotiations with ownership we just want to be able to live and like have a family and like just be able to like live in New Jersey we want to be able to like make a career out of working for a place like the Asbury Park Press for The Courier news for the home News Tribune Mike Davis is a reporter for the Asbury Park Press I make about a little over forty seven thousand dollars a year I've been with the press for eight years I've been in journalism for about 12 years he's one of the reporters gathering in White Plains to try and bring attention to gannett's CEO Mike Reed these walkouts are happening the same day as gannett's annual shareholder meeting he's devastated all these newsrooms he's destroyed news at a local level uh and even the company itself is failing the stock is down 70 over the last couple years he's the guy who graciously cut his salary down to three and a half million dollars this year folks in the Asbury Newsroom about a third of us could qualify for low-income housing we have people in my unit who have been with the company for 20 years and make under forty thousand dollars which is abysmal um if I were not married I'd still be living at home with my mother because I wouldn't be able to afford to live out on my own reporters tell me that tomorrow's papers in affected cities will have a lot fewer local stories than normal and if the environment around bargaining doesn't get any better there could be more strikes and they could last longer than just one day as a union we need to be able to do like whatever it takes to get what we need and what we deserve frankly they have to be afraid that we're going to hold our work and that when they run out of the pre-fab content that we have produced earlier in the week they're left with nothing and I do think that it could turn into a prolonged thing and I hope it does because it shows them that we're really really serious Gannett sent us this statement in response to this story our goal is to preserve journalism and serve our communities across the country as we continue to bargain in good faith to finalize contracts that provide Equitable wages and benefits for our valued employees Joe amdidas is the assistant director for the center for Cooperative media at Montclair and he says newsrooms slimming down is a national Trend we've seen newsrooms gutted across the country while these large corporations continue to conduct mergers do stock BuyBacks uh you know get massive loans and then refuse to reinvest that money into the workers and the journalism employees who do the work ambitis says a labor shortage could mean that fewer local stories are told throughout the state this summer there are raging wildfires and air quality alert and very high temperatures and it's also uh vacation time it's the summer there's going to be a lot of travel that's a lot of stories just in those two topics that will likely be covered uncovered or covered less Davis says that under the current proposal from management he'd be taking less money because his salary wouldn't change while his health care gets more expensive in White Plains I'm Ted Goldberg NJ Spotlight news [Music] [Music]