More Media News

• Chicago-based Tribune Publishing announced company wide furloughs last week, the Chicago Tribune reported. The three-week furloughs will be taken in weeklong pieces from May to July by nonunion employees making between $40,000 and $67,000 annually, the company said. Employees will still get health benefits but no salary during the furlough weeks. Employees may apply to leave the company and get severance in the place of the furlough, the company said.

The effect of the move on newsroom employees is unclear, the paper said. Most of the company’s newsrooms are unionized or trying to become unionized, the company said. In a memo to staff, CEO Terry Jimenez said the company also will pursue cost-saving measures with its unionized workforce. 

• Fort Wayne Newspapers is suspending publication of its News-Sentinel page for the time being. The page will be assessed for comeback as market conditions improve, said President and CEO Scott Stanford. News-Sentinel reporter/columnist Kevin Leininger has been furloughed with the suspension. Other employees also have been furloughed and some positions cut, the paper said. Fort Wayne Newspapers also produces the Journal Gazette (also Fort Wayne), the second-largest paper in Indiana. The two papers have a joint operating agreement. The Ogden Newspapers owns Fort Wayne Newspapers.

• The Philadelphia Inquirer extended offers of voluntary buyouts to 55 guild members in sales, Poynter reported. Another voluntary buyout offer was extended to full-time newsroom employees 65 and older after some staff members said they wanted that, Poynter says.

• The Gloucester Daily Times (Massachusetts) is dropping Tuesday and Saturday print, the paper announced.  

•  The News and Tribune, covering Clark and Floyd counties (Indiana), will start a five-day-a-week publishing schedule by ending the Monday paper this week.  

• The Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association has a new website, pacoronanews.org, featuring a collection of coronavirus articles and resources from around the state to showcase members’ coverage. Visitors to the site will be able to view publications by county and link directly to each outlet’s homepage or dedicated coronavirus page if applicable. https://pacoronanews.org/

• The Eden Prairie News and Lakeshore Weekly News (Minnesota) will put out their last editions this week, General Manager Laurie Hartmann announced. The papers were among the 11 purchased this year by Digital First Media, a subsidiary of Alden Global Capital. The other publications that are part of Southwest News Media, including weeklies in Chanhassen, Chaska and Shakopee, will go on publishing, the company said.

• Protocol, a tech site started by Politico’s parent company, is laying off 13 employees, according to Nieman Lab. 

• The New York Times will cease printing hard copies of travel and sports sections in the paper's Sunday edition and will instead print a section focused on sheltering in place, according to internal memos and sources, Cheddar reported. 

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