Mike Farrell: I won't vote for SAG strike

LOS ANGELES, Dec. 3 (UPI) -- Former Screen Actors Guild Vice President Mike Farrell says he won't vote "yes" when he gets his SAG strike authorization ballot.

SAG President Alan Rosenberg said last month that guild members are to be sent strike referendum ballots in December. SAG and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers met in November with a federal mediator in hopes of working out a new contract, as their most recent one expired June 30. However, the mediator ended the session after little progress was made.

AMPTP has repeatedly said the package it presented June 30 was its final offer, however, SAG has continued to fight for a better deal.

"I'm sure there will be the admonition that 'you're either with us or with the terrorist AMPTP.' Well I, for one, am not anti-union. God knows, as a member for over 40 years, I'm not anti-SAG. But I am anti-idiocy. I'm voting 'no,'" Variety.com quoted Farrell as saying in an e-mail Wednesday to members about the strike authorization ballot.

Amy Aquino and Arye Gross, leaders of Unite For Strength -- a group the Los Angeles Times says represents a moderate faction of actors within the union -- said in a message Tuesday that guild bosses haven't tried hard enough to avoid a work stoppage.

"In these historically difficult economic times, every reasonable possibility for making a deal must be explored before considering a job action, and based on the media reports we've seen, we're concerned this wasn't accomplished," the pair said.