Editorial Workers at Schneps Media Ask Management to Voluntarily Recognize Union

Editorial workers at Schneps Media, the New York City and Long Island publisher behind amNY and a broad network of local titles, have launched a union with the Independent Association of Publishers’ Employees, Local 1096 of The NewsGuild-CWA, and are asking management to voluntarily recognize it.

The organizing effort, announced by The NewsGuild-CWA on June 15, is notable not just because another newsroom has unionized, but because it spans a large slice of one of the region’s biggest hyperlocal media networks. Schneps Media says on its website that it publishes amNY along with 33 newspapers, 28 magazines, 20 websites and more than 50 annual events across New York City and Long Island. That makes the campaign broader than a single newsroom drive, covering editorial workers across multiple local outlets.

According to The NewsGuild, the proposed bargaining unit includes about 30 editorial employees at publications including amNY, Brooklyn Paper, Brownstoner, QNS, Long Island Press and Dan’s Papers, among others in the company’s city and Long Island portfolio. The union said 81% of eligible staff signed a mission statement supporting the drive and 85% signed union authorization cards. Those figures have not been independently verified in public reporting.

The workers are seeking what they describe as competitive, livable wages, affordable health care and benefits, sustainable staffing and working conditions, transparent raises and promotions, and stronger editorial standards and resources for hyperlocal reporting. Kirstyn Brendlen, a digital editor at Brooklyn Paper, said in a statement distributed by The NewsGuild and later highlighted by the AFL-CIO: “Schneps Media reporters can do a lot with a little, but we shouldn’t have to. A union contract will improve our working and living conditions, making it easier to do work that matters.”

The NewsGuild also said 16 people across Schneps’ news teams left the company in the last year, both voluntarily and involuntarily, a figure the union has pointed to as part of its case for better pay, staffing and workplace stability.

Workers have asked co-publishers Josh Schneps and Victoria Schneps to voluntarily recognize the union, which would allow bargaining to begin without a formal election. Voluntary recognition means an employer accepts the union based on signed authorization cards rather than requiring a vote supervised by the National Labor Relations Board, the federal agency that oversees private-sector union elections.

As of June 22, no public statement from Schneps Media responding to the union drive had been located in the source reporting. Public reporting reviewed through that date also did not show voluntary recognition by the company, a public representation petition filed with the National Labor Relations Board, or an unfair-labor-practice case tied to this bargaining unit.

The campaign has since been highlighted by the New York City Central Labor Council and the AFL-CIO, underscoring the attention the drive is drawing beyond Schneps’ own newsrooms. But the central question remains whether management will recognize a union that, according to The NewsGuild, already has support from a strong majority of editorial workers across a significant regional local-news operation.