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Service & Solidarity Spotlight: Desert Sun NewsGuild Workers Secure New Contract

Working people across the United States have stepped up to help out our friends, neighbors and communities during these trying times. In our Service & Solidarity Spotlight series, we'll showcase one of these stories every day. Here’s today’s story.

Workers at the Desert Sun NewsGuild in California agreed to a new contract that sets the highest pay floor at a Gannett publication. Highlights of the contract include a total compensation of $456,000 more in compensation over the next three years, an average 16.5% raise upon formal ratification of the contract, annual raises for all during the life of the three-year contract, new requirements during the hiring process for editors to attend DEI conferences for education and job recruitment, a key provision to promote diversity in hiring, the strongest protections against the use of artificial intelligence that any unionized Gannett newsroom has secured, strong protections for reductions in force and severance packages among other benefits.