E&P: Buyouts Announced at 'LA Times' (will cut up to 85 newsroom jobs)

Buyouts Announced at 'LA Times'
By E&P Staff
Published: November 16, 2005 3:59 PM ET


NEW YORK Los Angeles Times Editor Dean Baquet announced today that the paper will look to cut as many as 85 newsroom jobs by the end of the year, the second straight year of staff reductions. Employees have until Nov. 25 to accept the paper's buyout package. After that, layoffs will be considered.

Baquet's memo is below, followed by Publisher Jeff Johnson's announcement.

To: the Editorial Staff
From: Dean Baquet

I very much regret to announce that The Times will have to lose about 85 newsroom jobs before the end of the year. A few of the cuts have already been made through attrition. Some will come through a voluntary separation program. But others, unfortunately, will come through layoffs. The exact breakdown won't be known until we see how many people apply for the voluntary separation package.

You all know that this is a rough year for newspapers. The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have also announced significant cuts in staff or expenses. Other Tribune newspapers are making similar reductions in response to rising newsprint costs and concerns over a continuing decline in revenue.

Still, this is our second straight year of staff reductions, and this is a painful announcement to make. It is one I've worked hard to avoid....


http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001523548

They do not practice real journalism anymore. I'd sooner read the National Enquirer.

but I think the Times does some really good investigative work, and prints many stories about things that would otherwise never see the light of day. Some of their editorials are also very important, and, sometimes, courageous, IMO. I regret all of these cuts in the print press. Blogs are not quite there yet as far as news sources for most Americans. Most, if they get any news, get it from TV. I regret they don't get it from print. I find valuable stories from the print press every day in LBN.

look at the by-lines of articles you liked,
and see if they've been fired.

Some Fear a Vast Sell-Off of U.S. Land
A House bill would let mining firms and others buy federal acreage at a deep discount. Foes say it affects many holdings in the Sierra and deserts.

By Bettina Boxall, Times Staff Writer

A budget bill that the House of Representatives is expected to vote on this week would force the federal government to put "For Sale" signs on public recreation lands in California and the West, including national forest holdings throughout the Sierra Nevada and remote parts of the Mojave Desert.

Backers of the bill insist that the amount of land affected would be small, but former Interior Department officials and some experts on natural resource law say the legislation could result in the sale of millions of acres....

Slipped into a massive budget-cutting bill late last month by the House Resources Committee, headed by Rep. Richard W. Pombo (R-Tracy), the provision has been eclipsed by higher-profile battles over two other controversial plans that would expand oil drilling offshore and allow it in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Those proposals have been dropped for now, but the land-sale provision remains....

Because the West — especially the Sierra Nevada, California desert and Colorado Rockies — is studded with millions of mining claims dating to the 1800s, former Interior officials say the measure would open the door to the widespread privatization of federal lands used by millions of people for hiking, hunting, and off-road driving.

"When I first saw it, it took my breath away. It's really quite stunning," said Mat Millenbach, who was deputy director of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management during President Bush's first term. "This could have the impact of making public lands harder to get to and use. There will be huge issues of incompatible uses."...

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lands16nov16,0,1529178.story?coll=la-home-local

I hope she is able to continue.
Here's a google search for "Bettina Boxall"
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22Bettina+Boxall%22&btnG=Google+Search

it's now a right-wing rag.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=141x17599#17622

at Times Mirror and via letters to LAT/Trib Co

If newspapers, TV and radio news outlets would have actually REPORTED THE NEWS (election fraud, etc.), the last year would have seen record-breaking revenues!

Wake up, so-called journalists!

in the whole country if this trend keeps going.

Of course if corporations continue to outsource jobs and lay off tens of thousands and rip off their pensions, there will only be a few people left in the US with the money to subscribe to newspapers anyway.

:eyes:

for ourselves and save the reporters the trouble of transcribing it.

I used to live in the LA Times home delivery area, but not anymore. I get all my news on the internet.

The White House already proofs their own stories.

No tears here.

As the MSM crumbles, so goes one critical mechanism for controlling the population.

Meanwhile, the Net makes diversity of information and thought more accessible than at any time in the American experiment.

Fuck the leviathan news corporations. These are exciting times. :-)

originates in the MSM - we rely on the WashPost and
NYTimes to have the resources to do the
research that ordinary folk don't have the time or
money to do.
We need professional news gatherers, and
a new model that makes it pay has
yet to emerge.

without the NYT, WP and LAT. They could be much better, they have failed us miserably many times, but they bring much to light we would never find out about if we had no print press. Investigative reporters at the LAT have won several recent Pulitzers for, for example, a damning series on Wal-Mart and a hospital expose. I hope these reporters do not lose their jobs in this cut.