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<p style="font-weight: 400;"><strong>By Mike McCombs</strong></p>
<p style="font-weight: 400;">The journalists of The Island Packet and The Beaufort Gazette announced Wednesday in a press release that they have taken the first steps toward unionizing.</p>
<p style="font-weight: 400;">According to the release, more that 80 percent of eligible reporters, photographers and news producers have signed cards authorizing representation by the Washington-Baltimore News Guild, Local 32025 of the Communications Workers of America (CWA).</p>
<p style="font-weight: 400;">The employees have requested voluntary recognition from management.</p>
<p style="font-weight: 400;">The two newspapers, which share staff and essentially function as one newspaper, are currently owned by McClatchy. It has finalized its sale to Chatham Asset Management, a New Jersey-based hedge fund, for $32 million. The sale cam roughly six months after McClatchy filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.</p>
<p style="font-weight: 400;">The sale follows a decade of staff reductions and losses. In general, newsroom employment at newspapers in the U.S. dropped by 51% between 2008 and 2019,&nbsp;according to Pew Research. Staffing at the Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette has mirrored that, dropping from more than 40 reporters to just 11 full-time reporters and visual journalists, according to the release.</p>
<p style="font-weight: 400;"><em>This story will be updated.</em></p>
<p style="font-weight: 400;"><em>Mike McCombs is the editor of The Island News and can be reached at&nbsp;<a href="mailto:TheIslandNews@gmail.com">TheIslandNews@gmail.com</a>. He was employed at the Beaufort Gazette from 1997 to 1998 and then again as sports editor of The Island Packet and The Beaufort Gazette from 2012 to 2016.</em></p>
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