Thoughts on the Democrat & Chronicle newspaper

I've heard numerous negative comments about it, but it's hard to separate how much of it is the paper itself and how much of it is Gannett.

 

I grew up in Rochester and can tell you that the paper does fairly extensive coverage of the Bills, as well as Syracuse University football and basketball. There is also a handful of minor league teams (AAA baseball, AHL hockey, USL soccer, ABA basketball, shitty indoor football, indoor lax, outdoor lax) and a number of D3 colleges in the area.

I can also say that in my years of reading the paper, there has been very little turnover as far as writers go. I feel like I've been seeing the same bylines for quite some time now.

 

Labor relations are not good there, I think they've been without a contract since 1992.
Sports dept. covers Bills home and road.
They do a lot of Syracuse U. even though they're 90 minutes away, sports ed. is a SU alum.

 

As far as writers go, there hasn't been a staff change in at least five years.

I still wonder if the possible suitor is after a sports gig, and not something in news. There's much more turnover on that side...

 

They have at least two new writers, unless they're just interns or stringers, but I'm from Rochester and I was back there last week and saw two names I've never seen before. Otherwise the names have been the same for nearly as long as I've been able to read.

 

Thanks for the responses. And I apologize if I wasn't more specific about the job. It's a sports reporter opening and the job duties mainly involve preps. Currently, I'm at a daily in Virginia and have wanted to make the job to a bigger paper in terms of circulation. And yes, I have done a little research on the newspaper but that's what this message board is for, to get the opinons of other journalists out there. So if you have any other comments of the paper, feel free to run them. Thanks.

 

you can do a lot worse than to do preps in Rochester. Even with Gannett.

Particularly if you're at a small-ish paper in Virginia.

There's a decent bar scene. Lots of festivals in the spring and summer. Good folks. Reasonable degree of affluence, despite Kodak woes. Good small college scene. And in the summer, within 40 minutes you can be in rolling farmland.

An hour or so to Buffalo. 90 mins to Syracuse, three hours to Toronto. There are a lot worse places to be, especially early in one's career.

 

The D&C has never got a good rep as far as employee relations (and pay for that matter).

It's definitely worth to make the jump if it's something you want to do. The high school sports in the area are for the most part really good and I'm sure you'll have a good time with preps coverage.

Depending on what your life is like with your paper right now it might be perfect for you, especially because Rochester has so many different sports offerings from quality high school and D-III colleges to professional teams.

 

I hear they are going through a reorg. The ME there is a friend of mine. PM me if you want more details.

On a more general note...there are worse things than working for a Gannett paper these days. making money isn't as awful as a lot of people on this board seem to think. And believe it or not, they do take care of (at least some of) their employees.

 

The D&C can be as depressing as Rochester. However, it is a gig and better than nothing. Good Luck if the opening comes.

 

How come no mention of this on Gannett's jobs page?

 

Great question. I was wondering the same thing...