Newhouse Newspapers, which owns the
New Orleans Times-Picayune,
is planning major staff cuts at the newspaper and may reduce the frequency of its print publication schedule, the
New York Times’
Media Decoder blog reported.
The newspaper drew widespread praise and won a Pultizer Prize for its coverage of Hurricane Katrina.
According to the
New York
Times
report, Newhouse “will apparently be working off a blueprint the company used in Ann Arbor, Mich., where it reduced the frequency of the
Ann Arbor News,
emphasized the Web site as a primary distributor of news and in the process instituted wholesale layoffs to cut costs.”
Times-Picayune
editor Jim Amoss and two managing editors will leave the paper, and longtime publisher Ashton Phelps Jr. is retiring, the Times report said.
The
New York Times
report said that the Newhouse family bought the
Times-Picayune
in 1961 and merged it with the afternoon dialy. The paper has been published since 1837.
Media blogger Jim Romenesko
noted on his website
that the
Times-Picayune
remains profitable.
Romenesko also reported
that Newhouse is making similar changes at its Alabama papers. The newspapers will be printed only three days a week starting in the fall, and staff will be cut, the blog report said. Newhouse’s Alabama Media Group includes the
Birmingham News,
the
Press-Register
of Mobile, and the
Huntsville Times.
(Sources: Media Decoder,
New York Times,
May 23, 2012; JimRomenesko.com, May 24, 2012.)
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