Los Angeles City Councilmembers Introduce Resolution in Support of WGA Strike

Los Angeles City councilmembers introduced a resolution Friday in support of the Writers Guild of America amid the ongoing writers strike.

Councilmembers Hugo Soto-Martínez and Katy Yaroslavsky were among those calling on studios and streamers to return to the negotiating table to meet writers’ demands.

“This is a fight for the future of Hollywood,” Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martínez, who represents most of Hollywood, including Netflix and Paramount, said. “We can’t allow these big corporations to enjoy $30 billion in profits over the last few years, and then refuse to pay their workers a living wage.”

Writers have been on strike, picketing across Los Angeles and New York, since the beginning of May after the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers failed to reach an agreement on contract negotiations.

The full text of the resolution follows.

WHEREAS, the Writers Guild of America West (WGAW) and the Writers Guild of America East (WGAE) (jointly WGA), which collectively represent over 11,500 writers in film and television across the country, are currently without a contract and on strike; and

WHEREAS, the WGA’s reasonable demands to the major media companies that employ their members – including Disney, NBC Universal, Paramount, Netflix, Apple and Amazon – have not been met; and

WHEREAS, writers are facing the most comprehensive assault on their compensation and working conditions in a generation. Media companies have taken advantage of the industry’s transition to global streaming to underpay workers. As a result, writers are doing more work for less pay and with less job security; and

WHEREAS, this erosion of writer pay and working conditions has happened while their employers collected almost $30 billion in entertainment operating profits each year from 2017 to 2021; and

WHEREAS, without writers, the entertainment industry would not have stories to tell; and

WHEREAS, Los Angeles is the entertainment capital of the world, and has a vested interest in the sustainability of that industry’s workforce; and

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that by the adoption of this resolution, the Los Angeles City Council urges the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to come to the bargaining table and reach a fair deal with the workers of the WGA.