Santa Cruz Sentinel: To cut 21 percent of newsroom staff

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/cgi-bin/p/psafe/psafe.cgi?http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/archive/2007/June/08/biz/stories/01biz.htm

June 8, 2007

Sentinel to cut 8 newsroom positions
By Matt King
Sentinel staff writer

SANTA CRUZ — The Sentinel will cut its newsroom staff by 21 percent by the end of the month, Editor Tom Honig announced Thursday.

In an afternoon staff meeting, Honig said eight of the paper's 38 full-time newsroom employees — reporters, photographers, editors, copy editors and support staff — will be let go on July 1. In April, 33 workers in the paper's pressroom and mailroom were laid off.

Publisher David B. Regan said the cuts would force changes in the paper's news-gathering operations.

"It was difficult having the press and the mailroom leave, but hitting the newsroom hits us at our core," Regan said. "Originally, I thought [cuts] wouldn't affect the newspaper at all. I still think we can put out a good paper"

After the layoffs, the Sentinel will be devoting more of its resources to the Internet and conducting meetings with the public to find out what kind of coverage readers want in the paper.

"We're going to continue to make the paper smarter and provide people with the information they need in a new era," Honig said. "Times change and old models have to change with it. I wish we could go off into the future with as many, if not more, reporters and photographers"

The Sentinel has undergone several changes since it was put on the market by Ottaway Newspapers Inc. last year. The paper was sold twice in two months and purchased by the California Newspapers Partnership in February.

A subsidiary of MediaNews Group, CNP also owns the San Jose Mercury News and Monterey Herald. Eight people were laid off from the Herald in April, and Tuesday, it was announced that an undetermined number of Mercury News employees will be laid off this summer.

Contact Matt King at mking@santacruzsentinel.com.

 

Jesus. Eight more people sent into the world of selling real estate or doing PR....

What the fuck is going on.

 

Lean Dean, the cutting machine.

 

Soon, his papers won't have a enough people staffing them to put out a decent product, or has it already gotten to that point at some of them?

 

Let's see. Nope, my opinion of Dean Singleton has not changed.

 

Eight out of 38 is rough.

 

I'm about to jump off the newspaper ship. The fucking thing is sinking. Why are we still on it?

 

Last one cut turns out the lights.

 

I almost took a gig there way back when, but I heard it's just about impossible to live anywhere near Santa Cruz on what they pay. They've had as many as four staffers living together just to afford the rent. I really feel bad for these guys.

 

Where is the stop-loss line with layoffs at newspapers?
Or do these publishers and companies just keep cutting until there is no newsroom staff?

 

Who would have thought the Singleton takeover in NorCal would be even worse than expected?

I wonder if it would make more sense to kill the whole Santa Cruz paper and try to sell the subscribers on taking the Mercury News.

If the Mercury News had a true Santa Cruz zone --- which it used to have -- the product would be far superior.

 

I'm surprised they ran a story about it - give them credit for that. But I'm pretty sure they have met with readers before to find out what kind of coverage they want. And this is the result.
I think the stop-loss line is when there is no one to write the layoff article.