Last December Journal Newspapers Inc. closed two Washington D.C. county offices and fired eight employees, 10 days before a scheduled election to decide whether workers would be represented by a union. The National Labor Relations Board filed a complaint and Journal Newspapers Inc. has agreed to pay $71,500 to settle the dispute. The Journal admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement and maintained that economic necessity was the reason for the closed offices and cut jobs.
See "Journal to Pay Fired Workers In Settlement", Joshua Partlow, The Washington Post, August 5, 2003