Capital Gazette staff protest office closure

 

Capital Gazette (Annapolis, Maryland) staff protested Sept. 7 as parent company Tribune Publishing has shuttered the newsroom’s office in Annapolis, citing budget issues due to COVID-19, WJZ in Baltimore reported.

Capital Gazette staff will use space at the Baltimore Sun office.

In August, Tribune Publishing announced the closing of the Capital Gazette newsroom along with newsrooms in Westminster, Maryland, and in Florida and Pennsylvania.

The papers are still operating.

“Having an office meant everything to me, and taking it away meant nothing to the people of Tribune,” Capital reporter Selene San Felice said at the protest event, the station reported.

In 2018, five newsroom employees, Gerald Fischman, Rob Hiassen, John McNamara, Rebecca Smith and Wendi Winters, were killed in a shooting at the paper.

“We understand and are sensitive to how challenging the decision to close The Capital’s office is for our Annapolis-based employees, especially in the wake of the tragedy two years ago when we lost five of our colleagues,” said Max Reinsdorf, a spokesman for Tribune Publishing, the paper reported.

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