Reuters data centre slated for shutdown could close by end-2016 or later

Senior management will decide by year’s end whether to close the facility at Hauppauge on Long Island - opened by Reuters in November 1982 - by the end of 2016 or leave it open for another seven to ten years, according to Ron Sparacino, the centre’s manager.

The news was given by The Newspaper Guild of New York which is negotiating a new contract with Thomson Reuters. It said it was not news that the company planned to close Hauppauge - “after all, we negotiated enhanced severance for its technical and administrative staff in the last contract because back in 2010 management told us those jobs were in jeopardy.”

The union said managers were not reversing course on the potential loss of the nearly 23 remaining Guild jobs at Hauppauge, “they’re just moving the deadline - and proposing to take back the severance they agreed to under similar circumstances in the last contract talks. As Guild Unit Chair Dan Grebler told company representatives in response, 'That dog won’t hunt.'" ■