Dec. 13 (Bloomberg) -- The Screen Actors Guild’s New York board, splitting with the union’s national leadership, urged members to oppose a strike authorization because of the worsening U.S. economy.

The strike threat will no longer work as a strategy for obtaining a new contract with Hollywood studios, the New York board said in a letter yesterday. The recession, industry job reductions, and film and television programming cuts make it “irresponsible” to support a strike, they said.

“Negotiations failed. Then something else failed, too. The American economy,” the New York board said. “With that collapse, everything has changed.”

The defection is a setback for union President Alan Rosenberg and Executive Director Doug Allen, who have arranged meetings in Los Angeles and New York to build the 75 percent approval required for strike authorization. Union officials on the West Coast say they need members’ backing to force a restart of negotiations after federal mediation failed.

“It really exposes the fault line between Hollywood on the one hand and the regions and New York on the other,” Jonathan Handel, an entertainment attorney at TroyGould in Los Angeles, said in an interview.

Emergency Meeting

Voting on the strike authorization is scheduled to begin Jan. 2. In the letter, the New York board said all plans for the referendum should be halted. They demanded Rosenberg call an emergency meeting of the national board to replace the negotiating committee. The studios would then return to the bargaining table, according to the letter.

In a statement, Rosenberg said he would schedule a meeting, but to discuss the ramifications of the New York board’s “extraordinarily destructive and subversive” action.

“The global economy was failing before the new board voted in October to send this referendum,” Rosenberg said. “When economic times are tough, members rely on their union even more to protect them from management’s tactics.”

Jesse Hiestand, spokesman for the studios’ bargaining group, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, declined to comment. Walt Disney Co., Viacom Inc., Time Warner Inc., News Corp., Sony Corp. and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. are among the members.

Second Strike?

Actors, writers and behind-the-scenes workers such as stage hands and electricians lost work during the three-month strike by writers that ended in February. Their walkout cost the Los Angeles area about $2 billion, according to Jack Kyser, chief economist at the Los Angeles Economic Development Corp.

A strike by SAG’s 120,000 members would probably cost more because a majority of projects at major studios would be shut down. During the writers strike, studios were able to continue work on films and shows for which they already had scripts.

The guild is the last of Hollywood’s unions to negotiate with studios. The smaller actors union, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, reached an agreement with studios earlier this year, as did the Directors Guild of America.

About 40,000 SAG members also belong to Aftra and would be eligible to work on television shows under its jurisdiction. Aftra represents most scripted cable shows. SAG represents actors appearing in movies and most prime-time dramas and comedies.

To contact the reporter on this story: Michael White in Los Angeles at mwhite8@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: December 13, 2008 18:42 EST