Also this issue:

Classroom Chaos
Did Edison's reduction of support staff help foster school violence?
-Elisa Ludwig

Free Marty!
The ringleader of a band of stadium gatecrashers has his day in court.
-Daryl Gale

The Big Kahuna
-Mary F. Patel

The Bell Curve
City Paper's weekly gauge of Philly's Quality of Life

January 9-15, 2003

on media

Soundbites

by Deborah Bolling

While most of us looked forward to ringing in 2003, Inky veteran Gloria Hoffner wasn't exactly filled with cheer this New Year.

Last September, Hoffner, a suburban staff reporter, suffered a minor tumble on a staircase at the Conshohocken bureau, where she has worked for the past 16 years. Initially, the injury -- an apparent twisted ankle -- seemed innocuous, but during the next few weeks it escalated to a full-scale medical emergency.

Soon, Hoffner found herself unable to walk and eventually wound up under a surgeon's knife. The diagnosis: a herniated disk with a broken chip located in her back.

While most employees dread injury and protracted illnesses, corporate health care usually ensures the continuance of one's salary and an allotment of hospitalization coverage.

However, in Hoffner's case, as a member of the Suburban Writers and Photographers (SWP) unit, a segment of the Inky workforce with limited benefits, within seven weeks (based on her tenure) she had exhausted her sick days. By comparison, her co-workers in the main unit with equal tenure can receive up to 40 weeks of medical leave benefits. By the end of the year, Hoffner's personal, vacation and "comp" days had also run out. To make matters worse, as the new year approached, Hoffner found herself in a position where her benefits would be renewed only if she were able to return to work by Jan. 2 -- which her doctors said was impossible.

"I've never had anything broken or even sprained in my life," Hoffner says. "I've been a very blessed person. Only time I've ever been hospitalized was for the birth of my two kids. And in 16 years, I had never used a full week of sick time."

In the genuine spirit of the holiday season, more than 35 of Hoffner's co-workers rallied to her aid, offering up their own personal and vacation days to compensate for her shortfall. However, Hoffner says she was informed that her co-workers' benefit days were non-transferable.

"I really enjoy my job and I really worked hard at my job," Hoffner says. "I feel very betrayed and hurt by a company that I've worked at for 16 years where my co-workers were so generous to donate their time but the company won't back them up."

Rob Barron, Philadelphia Newspapers Inc. (PNI) director of labor relations, says that the existing Newspaper Guild of Greater Philadelphia contract has no provisions for allowing employees to trade days.

"[Hoffner] has specific benefits as defined by the [union] contract," Barron says. "But your vacation is your vacation. Those days are not a commodity to be traded or given away. This aspect of the contract has already been negotiated by the union. In addition, the union has never offered [the suggestion of employees trading days] to PNI management. They've never raised it as a possibility. It has never come up."

Guild President Henry Holcomb says the fight hasn't been lost yet.

"I'm not sure that the company has turned us down," Holcomb says, optimistically. "These days, it's pretty standard with most companies that when sick time has expired, that's it. However, we'll see what we can do -- but we need it to be worked out without setting a precedent."