Friday Morning Linkage

Former Times publisher Johnson takes job with Burkle's Yucaipa Cos. - LA Times
Former Los Angeles Times Publisher Jeffrey M. Johnson has taken an executive position with Yucaipa Cos., the private investment firm that last year joined in a bid to buy the newspaper's parent, Tribune Co. of Chicago.Johnson will be a principal in Los Angeles-based Yucaipa, founded by supermarket magnate Ron Burkle, and will oversee its current media interests, which include parts of former Vice President Al Gore's Current TV channel and Source Interlink, a major distributor of magazines and CDs.

Tribune inducted into Hall of Shame - LA Biz Observed
It's the annual Calpers rundown of companies that have failed in the area of corporate governance and financial performance. Ten other companies made it on the list: Marsh & McLennan Cos., Eli Lilly & Co., Sara Lee Corp., International Paper Co., Corinthian Colleges Inc., Tenet Healthcare Corp., EMC Corp., Dollar Tree Stores Inc., Kellwood Co. and Sanmina-SCI Corp. Tribune gets dinged for financial performance, but there's also the corporate governance stuff:

Proposal for Tribune Said to Lose Momentum - New York Times
As a March 31 deadline nears for deciding the fate of the Tribune Company, the proposal from Sam Zell, the Chicago real estate billionaire, is falling from favor, according to people close to the situation.

Big blow to Los Angeles Times - LAObserved
Science writer Robert Lee Hotz is leaving the Times for the Wall Street Journal to write the Science Journal column. An elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a leader of the National Association of Science Writers, Hotz has been based recently in New York.

Advocate's union files grievance with Tribune Co. - Stamford Times
The union representing 40 editorial employees at The Advocate and Greenwich Time is filing a grievance against the Tribune Company which is selling the two papers to Gannett Co., Inc. for $73 million. Local 2110 UAW Tuesday filed a grievance against the Chicago-based company complaining that the union's contract, which extends until September 2008, was not considered in the sale of the paper to Virginia-based Gannett.

NLRB Claims Santa Barbara Paper Wrongly Fired 7 Staffers - Editor & Publisher
A day after the Santa Barbara News-Press lost its challenge against a newsroom vote to unionize last fall, the troubled newspaper has been dealt another blow as the National Labor Relations Board chose to uphold a string of unfair labor charges, including the unlawful firing of seven staffers engaged in union activities.

Two dozen to take Star Tribune buyouts - Minnesota Monitor
In a joint email to staff at the Star Tribune, managing editor Scott Gillespie and editor Nancy Barnes revealed that 24 newsroom employees would take voluntary buyouts.

Color hits Tribune's op-ed pages - Chicago Business
The Chicago Tribune’s opinion and editorial pages have taken on another dimension. A recently completed press upgrade has brought color to the pages, as well as to other parts of the newspaper. “It’s been spot color so far,” Bruce Dold, editorial page editor for the Chicago Tribune, said of the Op-Ed pages. “As we increase capacity, it will be more frequent, but I don’t know if it will be" every day on those pages.