Tribune buyouts announced today

This, yes. All of it.

After the first layoff or buyout or "voluntary separation," you learn about not investing emotionally. Do your work, do it well, next day rinse and repeat.

 

Sickening that the publisher said that. My problem with suits is they never rebel. They treat the reporters like crap at all times and never acknowledge those at the top are awful people who make awful decisions.

 

I feel really sorry for the crew at the Tribune properties. I hadn't worked there in more than 10 years, but I still keep in contact with a lot of them. Some really good people.

 

The Richmond Times-Dispatch hired David Teel today. Tremendous get for the T-D.

 

I would like to say I always feel sorry for those who get laid off and treated poorly by newspapers. If you've ever read my angry posts, please understand I feel awful for those reporters and copy editors laid off and furloughed. Sorry if my compassion for them doesn't come through.

 

Heh.

More than 100 Tribune Publishing employees told off their bosses in an internal Slack channel yesterday, calling out executives by name for putting shareholders’ interests over workers’ well-being and ability to report and deliver crucial local news to their communities, while pleading with them to consider alternatives to sweeping furloughs and cuts. The top boss responded by running away.

Tribune Publishing, which operates iconic papers like the New York Daily News, Baltimore Sun, and Chicago Tribune as well as lesser-known but vital local papers in eight markets, is backed by the reviled vulture capital firmAlden Global Capital, best known for stripping the Denver Post for parts. Earlier this year, the company offered buyouts to all employees who'd been working there eight years or more. More recently, facing the same pressure every media company is facing, Tribune Publishing has been instituting rolling cuts and furloughs as a result of financial stress caused by the coronavirus pandemic. On April 9, the company announced permanent pay cuts of 2 to 10 percent for all non-union employees making more than $67,000 a year. CEO Terry Jimenez generously said he would forgo his salary—$575,000, a year per an SEC filing—for two weeks.


On April 21, the company announced new three-week furloughs for employees making as little as $40,000 a year. Some of the Tribune newspapers are unionized; as a result, the company must negotiate with the NewsGuild in order to institute the furloughs. The Morning Call, the Hartford Courant, the Tidewater Guild (comprising three Virginia newspapers), the Chesapeake Guild (comprising the Capital Gazette and other suburban newspapers), and company’s shared print group, called Design and Production Studio (DPS) are bargaining together. As they do so, staffers are putting pressure on their overlords by making them look like the assholes they are.

"I can't afford three weeks without pay," wrote one staffer in an internal company-wide Slack channel with more than 2000 people in it.

"My husband was laid off and we have a daughter in college," another wrote.

"Tribune gives $9 million on shareholder dividends, and then tells employees it's critical that they take pay cuts and furloughs that will save them just $556,979," another staffer wrote. "The person who made these decisions at Tribune hasn't mastered basic math."

The Hartford Courant Guild posted snippets of the coordinated Slack action, as did a reporter from the Daily Press. But the scope of the day-long roast is best observed in its fuller glory.

Staffers named various executives including Jimenez, vice-president of sales Randy Novak, and the newspapers’ editors-in-chiefs in nearly every post. (Jimenez at one point apparently deactivated his Slack account, so that he was no longer able to be tagged in the messages. A Tribune Publishing spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.)​

Boss Flees Slack as Workers Deride Corporate Greed

Oh, there are screenshots at the link … not just snippets, but the whole thing.

 

Ha ha. The suit ran away. You can't make this stuff up.

 

If you're currently making $40,000, you'll probably make more on furlough (depending on your state).

In that sense, furlough is far superior to a pay cut, at least until the CARES Act runs out on June 30.

 

Suits don't care.

Employees are just a cog, a number. Cut them, move along, pay dividends. Layoffs and furloughs? Eh, just the staff whining about it on that Slack thing.

Two, three quarters or a year later, do it all again.