The Democrat and Chronicle newsroom union has overwhelmingly voted down a contract offer that the paper's management has described as its "firm, final, and best."

            The Newspaper Guild of Rochester rejected the contract by a 51 to 4 vote on December 1.

            What happens next? This is where things could get interesting. When the company announced the "final" offer a month ago, the union was taken a bit by surprise since, officers said, talks had been improving. But the "firm, final and best" language paves the way for Gannett to declare an impasse and impose the contract.

            In a one-page communiqué to its membership, union leaders told editorial staff members after the vote that they hoped the lopsidedness of the vote against the contract worked to their favor.

            "The Guild's bargaining committee will formally notify the company in a letter today and stress that the overwhelming margin (93 percent of the vote against the proposal) demonstrates the need to return to the table to find a middle ground on outstanding differences," the letter read. The Guild will also ask the company to keep a federal mediator, which it just recently admitted, at future bargaining sessions.

            The company hadn't said previously whether it would seek to impose the contract, releasing only terse, single-sentence statements about its long-running dispute with the Guild. (It's company policy not to comment on personnel issues.)

            D&C spokesperson Tom Flynn e-mailed this response to City's request for a comment on the contract vote: "A decision on that contract was entirely in the hands of its membership. We have nothing more to say at this time, out of respect to our employees.