From: FitzSimons, Dennis J.
Sent: Friday, June 23, 2006 6:16 AM
Subject: Update
Dear Fellow Employee:
As we close out what has been another busy week, here's a brief review and update:
On Tuesday we announced a management succession plan at the Hartford Courant. On July 10, Steve Carver from WATL-TV, Atlanta, will be joining the Courant as president. Jack Davis will continue serving as publisher and CEO through the end of 2006. At that time, Steve will succeed Jack in the publisher and CEO roles. Jack has skillfully guided the Courant for six years and before that served in key roles within the publishing group. Steve's leadership qualities, including strong sales and news experience, will bring a fresh perspective to Hartford.
As anticipated, the Federal Communications Commission announced on Wednesday that it will begin a formal review of the current media ownership rules. This is long overdue and we welcome a new rulemaking process. Nothing is certain, but we are optimistic that the FCC is now on a path that will ultimately grant permanent relief on the newspaper-broadcast cross ownership issue. You can expect to hear and see lots of media coverage on this subject in the next several months.
Tribune Broadcasting this week acquired the off-network syndication rights to "Two and a Half Men" from Warner Bros. Our stations will launch the hit CBS comedy in the fall 2007. Fewer high-quality sitcoms are available in syndication these days, and this one will help build local ratings and revenues.
On the diversity front, Tribune has been named a "Top 10 Company for Latinos" by DiversityInc, a wellregarded national magazine and online publisher. It was noted that Latinos account for 7.5 percent of Tribune managers and 17 percent of the company's board of directors.
Finally, our stock tender offer expires at midnight this Monday, June 26. We expect to issue a press release with preliminary results of the tender on Tuesday morning, and we'll see that you receive that information as soon as possible.
We are making progress. Thanks for your efforts.
Sincerely,
Dennis
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1 comment:
How pathetic! With the turmoil and power struggle going on within your Tribune, Fitzsimons attempts to pass off this kind of stuff (below) as a “company update."
...On the diversity front, Tribune has been named a "Top 10 Company for Latinos" by Diversity Inc, a well regarded national magazine and online publisher. It was noted that Latinos account for 7.5 percent of Tribune managers and 17 percent of the company's board of directors.
Now, Tribune’s web page (http://www.tribune.com/about/bios/board_index.html) pictures 11 board members (thought I once heard there were 12.) Two have Hispanic sir names, however, one of them looks as white as George Bush and the other appears more Italian. If the only criteria your fellow employee Dennis used in his calculation were the directors’ names, that would come to 18.18%. If there are actually 12 board members, the quotient changes to 16.66%. Since Dennis quotes an exact 17%, and given your company’s focus on numeric accuracy following several circulation fiascos, he must have used another standard. The math just doesn’t jibe.
Since most Americans have a whole bunch of DNA floating around in their bodies, perhaps an audit was conducted. Certainly there are private labs that could easily, although expensively, perform DNA testing on a measly 11 (or 12) board members.
In a quest to balance the numbers, I reviewed your directors’ photos. I’ll put that Jeffery Chandler guy at 35% Hispanic (after all, most Chandler procreation took place in Southern California.) Despite the Italian features, I’m going to be generous and give Mr. Enrique Hernandez Jr. a whopping 60% rating. It’s rumored he orders in Spanish when at Mexican restaurants and can count to diez (10 for you gringos.) The rest of the board looks pretty white to me. So, to equal an exact 17%, the remaining directors must share genes, that if combined, would make 0.95 of one, full blooded Hispanic.
Icaramba! When is corporate America going to get off this kick? We are all people and the important thing is what we hold in our hearts and what we value. I suspect the Tribune Board members are about as diverse in those characteristics as a pack of Titleist Pro golf balls, and that is certainly not worthy an ”update.”
Just my opinion.
Outsider
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