Ken Howard elected SAG president

From AP

Ken Howard, a proponent of merging two actors unions for better negotiating clout, has been elected president of the Screen Actors Guild, the union said Thursday.

Howard’s election — along with that of slate partner Amy Aquino as secretary-treasurer — raises the likelihood that the guild will have tighter coordination with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists in new contract talks.

Those talks are to begin with the Hollywood studios in October 2010.

The union and its 120,000 members are coming off a tough round of negotiations in which SAG failed to gain new concessions from the studios after breaking off joint bargaining with AFTRA last year.

The 65-year-old actor, who also won a supporting actor Emmy on Sunday for “Grey Gardens,” called for greater unity with AFTRA and other unions such as the writers’ and directors’ guilds.

“We need to continually remind ourselves that we’re all on the same team, fighting for the same thing,” he said in a statement. “By pulling together, we’ll only grow stronger.”

Some 45,000 of AFTRA’s 70,000 members also belong to SAG, and the union supported a merger with SAG in 1998 and 2003 only to see those efforts fail.

Howard won 47 percent of the 27,295 ballots that were returned by about 99,500 dues-paying guild members.