The Screen Actors Guild and American Federation of Television and Radio Artists boards of directors are scheduled to vote on a proposed SAG-AFTRA merger agreement over the next few days. Depending on their progress, they could make an announcement during the SAG Awards on Sunday.

If the boards vote for the merger -- as widely anticipated -- it would not be adopted until a supermajority of members in each guild vote for it. It is unclear when that voting would begin.

Also read: Ken Howard on the SAG/AFTRA Merger: 'A Hurricane Couldn't Stop Us' [4]

SAG's board is meeting Friday and Saturday. AFTRA's meets Saturday and, if necessary, Sunday.

Representatives of the unions declined comment.

The unions have been talking about merging for years. In 2003, nearly 58 percent of SAG members voted to merge the two – a clear majority but short of the supermajority actually needed to proceed.

The proposal now under consideration [5] has been in the works for months.

Last year, AFTRA’s New Union Committee and SAG’s Merger Task Force formed a joint committee called the "G1," or Group for One Union. That committee broke into study groups, which examined governance and structure, finance and dues, collective bargaining, pension, health and retirement, operations and staff and member education and outreach.

The G1 spent nine days this month [6] working on its recommendations for a merger. The SAG and AFTRA boards now will vote on the package that G1 developed.

SAG's president, Ken Howard, was elected on a pro-merger platform. His AFTRA counterpart, Roberta Reardon, also supports the merger.