According to The Hollywood Reporter, 63 of Walt Disney Studios production workers voted to unionize in the labor board election.
What’s Happening:
- 63 production employees, including production coordinators, production managers, and production supervisors, with Walt Disney Animation Studios have voted to unionize.
- They voted to join the Animation Guild in a National Labor Relations Board ballot count that happened on Wednesday.
- There were 68 voters total, and only five workers voted against.
- If neither of the parties file an objection to the result within five days, they will be certified, and labor and management can begin bargaining the first contract.
- This comes after some legal concerns over whether certain members of this group were eligible to join the union.
- Disney argued that production managers and production supervisors were managers and did not share a “community of interest” with production coordinators.
- A NLRB acting regional director found that it was “appropriate” and issued a direction of election with all the roles included.
- Production coordinator Maggie Hughes said in a statement at the time that the win “exemplifies the core of why we’re unionizing.” She added, “We knew throughout this process that everyone in our unit deserves to be eligible but the company still decided to pursue this long and arduous process in an attempt to divide us.”
- In March, the workers first announced their intent to unionize, stating that Disney denied their requests to recognize the group.
- Production coordinator Shannon Henley said, at the time of the unionization attempt’s announcement, “Even though I love my job, I regularly must consider if I should instead find a job with better pay, better hours, better benefits, and a more viable career path forward. Joining TAG gives me hope that I’ll no longer have to consider leaving my dream job in order to live comfortably.”