Posted by chicagomedia.org on August 27, 2008 at 21:47:28:
The Chicago Sun-Times newsroom is bracing for another round of cuts, which may or may not be eased by Tuesday's resignation of sports columnist Jay Mariotti.
Sun-Times Editor Michael Cooke said Wednesday, in a memo to staff, that a package of proposed cuts was presented to Newspaper Guild representatives. "The number has been reduced through recent attrition," Cooke wrote. "We'll be talking -- and negotiating -- over the next few days and I expect the picture to be clearer by the end of next week. … The next few weeks are going to be hard as we say goodbye to valued colleagues and good friends."
Cooke would not elaborate, and union sources said the full effect of Mariotti's resignation, taking a six-figure salary off the books, was not immediately clear.
Cuts have been expected since mid-June, when Sun-Times Media Group Chief Executive Cyrus F. Freidheim Jr., the Sun-Times' publisher, said revenue declines had negated the anticipated benefits of $50 million in cost-cutting this year (including elimination of nearly 20 percent of staff company-wide) and warned of additional cost-cutting if revenue continued to slide.
"The Sun-Times continues to manage through the unprecedented newspaper economic downturn," Cooke said in today's memo. "While our circulation, in context, continues to be acceptable, advertising revenues are awful. So again we are left with no choice but to cut our costs to try to match the reduced income."
Of the coming cutbacks, he said: "To state the obvious: This is awful. We are all anxious."
Separately, Cooke issued a decidedly unsentimental statement concerning Mariotti's exit after 17 years, and less than three months after extending his contract into 2011: "We wish Jay well and will miss him--not personally, of course--but in the sense of noticing he is no longer here, at least for a few days."
Responding via email, Mariotti said: "They're mad because I went on the radio today and honestly answered questions about the weak health of the paper. I politely said this is largely the spillover poison of [former parent company boss Conrad] Black and [publisher F. David] Radler, and that I feel like I'm getting off the Titanic,'' he said. "So, they fire back. Which is why I'm glad to be out of there and moving on."
(Phil Rosenthal)