Author: Deborah Rybak

(UPDATED 10/22) I am not without a sense of humor (anybody see the Ambiguously Gay Duo/Minneapolis police spoof on SNL Saturday?) and I am a big, big fan of the Jon Stewart-Stephen Colbert week-nightly comedy hour on Comedy Central.

So why don’t I find this recent “I’m running for president as both a Democrat/Republican in South Carolina” schtick of Colbert’s particularly funny? The rest of the media is just wetting its pants over it, as evidenced by the boatload of press the faux right-winger has generated since he hinted at his big announcement last Tuesday on his pal Stewart’s show, then made the announcement on his own show.

Nobody’s been more anxious to be in on the joke than the New York Times , which seems particularly devoted to the satirist’s nascent campaign.

Maureen Dowd appeared to start it all a week ago with the cute trick of turning over her column to him, where he hinted at the pending “news.” This is the same Pulitzer-Prize winning hardballer who turned into a blushing, giggling schoolgirl around Colbert and Stewart during an interview for Rolling Stone last year.

Colbert’s announcement was followed by a second Times story that intimated that the man was really serious, having placed calls to South Carolina political apparachiks.

Now today, following Colbert’s appearance on Meet the Press [transcript here]our adored local boy and big time columnist David Carr weighed in on l’affaire Colbert and finally, finally began to peel back the Saran Wrap on this bullshit…even if he did so with the utmost in respect and tenderness.

Big media was taken to task during the release of “Borat” for playing along with Sacha Baron Cohen’s grotesque character rather than forcing Cohen himself to the forefront of interviews. The media hung its head in shame–kind of–and the movie went on to make gazillions at the box office. Now it appears that hangover has subsided and it’s once again time to report sham as news and vice versa, and send Colbert’s book sales and ratings soaring.

Steve, my plea borrows some infamous words from your buddy Jon: Stop. Stop. Stop hurting America.

Stop helping mainstream media behave like fawning wannabe-cool assholes. Stop. Go do your show. Sell your book–you’ve got a platform most authors would kill for.

I’m seriously trying to figure out whether the stock market’s going down the tubes, if we’re about to bomb the shit out of Iran, and which actual presidential candidate is worthy of my attention. Frankly, all your dicking around is distracting formerly reputable journalists from doing their jobs. It was cute when Pat Paulson did it–everyone knew he was kidding.

I’m not even sure half your viewers know that your show is a spoof, let alone your candidacy. That’s the scariest development of all, if you continue with this bit.

LAMBERT:
I have to add this, from hyper-glossy Portfolio mag. It pretty well echoes Deborah’s take on the Colbert campaign.

LAMBERT: Oh boy. The wagon is rolling. Now there’s this from Gawker.com. And this from Huffington Post.

RYBAK: They can eat my dust. Cool, gives Jimmy and his buddy others to yell at….

The tentative deal between the Pioneer Press’s newspaper guild and Dean Singleton’s MediaNews doesn’t look so hot at first glance — the guild agreed to a pension freeze, a one-time vacation concession and significant changes to its medical and disability plans in return for a paltry two to three percent raise. [The entire agreement is detailed in the previous post].

Still, unit chairman and bargaining committee member Alex Friedrich said Thursday, “We’re feeling relief that it wasn’t worse.”

Expectations were extremely low when Singleton’s people started throwing out all kinds of shitty ideas during negotiations. Among them: Imposing a two-tier wage scale, reducing mileage reimbursement from 45 to 35 cents, and taking team leaders out of guild coverage.

“There were more than a dozen things like that,” Friedrich said. “So these [concessions], although really big hits, were not as bad as the entire package could have been. I’m not about to say it’s a great deal. But considering what could have happened during a long-drawn out negotiating period, it’s the best thing we could have gotten under the circumstances.”

Friedrich was proud that the Guild didn’t accept management’s health care proposal: “We came up with a compromise medical insurance plan that had not been proposed.”

The Guild also got management to agree to look “into a wide range of issues and complaints that have been bubbling in the advertising section.”

[A lot of those problems arose following then-publisher Par Ridder’s detrimental reorganization of the department shortly before he bailed out of St. Paul to move across the river and inflict more “right-sizing” at the Star Tribune.]

The full Guild will discuss and vote on the new contract late next week and Friedrich acknowledged that “there are going to be a number of people who are really upset with these large concessions–I’ll admit that some of our veterans are going to be peeved.”

Of course, there aren’t as many veterans to be peeved as before, since so many of them have already exited on one of the paper’s many buyout offers.

So why did Singleton pull back from what many expected to be a complete pulverization of the PiPress guild (much like what Avista has planned for the coming Strib’s guild contract negotiations)?

Friedrich was circumspect. “I can only offer my opinion, but anyone who’s been paying attention to [Singleton’s] own filing reports on Standard and Poor’s could question his situation regarding the amount of debt that MediaNews has taken on.”

I still smell a Joint Operating Agreement brewing in the two papers’ futures.

This just in: Dean Singleton’s PiPress and the newspaper guild have a tentative deal. Here’s the memo:

October 18, 2007

Guild, Pioneer Press reach tentative agreement on 4-year contract

After three days of intensive, off-the-record talks, the Guild and the Saint Paul Pioneer Press reached agreement late Wednesday on a four-year contract covering 340 employees.

The tentative agreement, which runs through July 31, 2011, would increase wages for all employees by 2 percent on July 1, 2008; 2 percent on July 1, 2009; and 3 percent on 2010. The MediaNews matching 401(k) plan would be offered to eligible employees upon ratification.

The agreement includes a pension freeze, a one-time vacation concession, and significant changes to medical insurance and disability pay. It leaves intact nearly all of the language in the contract, including seniority on layoffs, the right to daily overtime and mileage reimbursement. It avoids the two-tier wage scheme the company had sought, and newsroom team leaders would remain covered by the Guild.

If ratified, the agreement would bar layoffs through December 31, 2008.

Three key issues that Guild members identified as critical to the future of the Pioneer Press were addressed in the talks: 1) the company agreed to partner with the Guild to apply for a grant of up to $400,000 from the state of Minnesota to design a training program focused on multimedia skills and the paper’s digital future; 2) the company agreed to a joint committee to investigate and make recommendations to resolve issues and concerns affecting productivity in advertising; and 3) the company agreed to include content employees at TwinCities.com in the Guild.

A membership vote on the tentative agreement will be scheduled for the middle part of next week. More details about the agreement will be provided beginning Friday, Oct. 19. A unit meeting will be scheduled on Wednesday, Oct. 24 to present the agreement and answer questions.

Unless otherwise noted in the following summary, all existing contract language would remain unchanged.

Duration of contract: Four years, expiring July 31, 2011. Wages: Across-the-board raises of 2 percent on July 1, 2008, 2 percent on July 1, 2009, and 3 percent on July 1, 2010. Medical insurance: This proved to be the most difficult issue to resolve, because of significant changes planned by MediaNews in 2008 — changes just recently made known to the Guild bargaining committee. In a nutshell, the changes include a new, less expensive base plan upon which our rates for the HealthPartners plan, which most of our members use, is based. The effect was to create large increases in premiums for members on the HealthPartners plan. The company would have imposed those changes on January 1, under the terms of our expired contract, regardless of whether a settlement was reached. The Guild committee worked to mitigate the impact of the change by seeking new quotes from HealthPartners for the existing plan, and for a new, second HealthPartners plan that would be more affordable but would have higher co-pays. As a result, HealthPartners premiums will rise, but not as much as they would have otherwise. The Guild also secured a cap on costs for the hardest-hit group: two adults with no children.

(More specifics on the changes: The former Knight Ridder Blue and Green plans offered by United HealthCare would be replaced effective January 1, 2008 with two new national, self-insured plans offered by MediaNews. The two plans, administered by Blue Cross, include a “core” option and a “buy-up” option with a higher premium. Under both options, employees choosing single coverage would pay 22 percent of the premiums; the three other coverage options — employee plus spouse, employee plus children, and family — would be offered at 30 percent of the premium. The current HealthPartners plan would continue to be offered, alongside a new HealthPartners option with benefits similar to the old Knight Ridder Blue plan. The Blue Cross “buy-up” plan would serve as the base plan for calculating premium contributions for the HealthPartners plans. Several factors will cause the employee share of the HealthPartners premiums to increase substantially. )

Retiree medical: The current retiree medical options would continue to be offered to employees who are 55 or who turn 55 and who choose to retire before July 31, 2011. Coverage would not be available to employees retiring after that date. The change does not affect retirees now receiving medical coverage.

Pension: The Guild pension plan would be frozen, but, for the life of this contract, employees would continue to receive service credit. That means veteran employees can accrue service under this contract to qualify for early retirement, and less senior employees can continue to accrue service to vest in the plan. The freeze does not affect any benefits accrued by employees to date, and has no effect on retirees now receiving benefits. The company must continue to make payments to bring the plan to fully funded status.

401(k): Guild-represented employees would become eligible upon ratification for the MediaNews 401(k) program under the same terms as management employees. The plan includes a 50 percent match up to 6 percent of an employee’s contributions (3 percent maximum employer match). Previous service with the company counts toward vesting.

TwinCities.com: Content employees at TwinCities.com would become part of the Guild bargaining unit. Freelance: The Guild agreed to language permitting the company to use freelance material for prep and small college sports, as well as for police blotter items and daily suburban briefs similar to those written by news clerks. Training: The company would work with the Guild to identify and partner with a local college to apply for a state Job Skills Training Program grant of up to $400,000. The money would be used to create and provide a training program specific to the needs of Pioneer Press employees as the paper continues to expand its presence on the web. Among other things, the grant would help newsroom employees obtain and enhance multimedia skills.

Advertising: The company agreed to a joint Guild-management committee to investigate workplace issues and concerns in the department and to present recommendations designed to improve communication, productivity, and revenue growth. The Guild agreed to eliminate minimum commission rates that had been replaced with a different commission structure in the department (so-called “commission-grid plans”), and also agreed to allow business development accounts of roughly $40,000 or less and inactive accounts to be transferred from salaried to commission sales representatives. The company agreed, in turn, to index base wages for commission-grid plans to the raises negotiated for other employees; to elevate sales representatives on the commission-grid plans from Tier 1 to Tier 2 base pay not later than 15 months from their date of hire; to guarantee for two months the payment of a minimum of 100 percent to goal for new hires and for commission sales representatives transferred to new territories; to use average daily earnings as the basis for computing paid time off; and to resolve a grievance filed over average daily earnings by making all affected employees whole for their losses.

Vacation: The Guild agreed to move to a new accrual system. The effect of the change is this: the company eventually gets to wipe more than $1 million in accrued vacation off its books, resulting in a one-time savings. Members who continue working do not lose any vacation time. The number of weeks granted per years of service is unchanged. But when a member leaves the PP, chances are he or she will not receive the payout for previously “accrued” time as in the past. Here’s how the change would be implemented: Effective January 1, 2009, employees will earn and use vacation in the same year; currently, employees earn vacation in one year and use it in the next. (Employees will be able, in the new accrual system, to take vacation before it’s earned.) Effective January 1, 2008, when the transition to the new system would begin, employees would be eligible to use the full amount of vacation earned in 2007, but would not accrue new vacation until January 1, 2009. The change, again, would have no affect on the amount of vacation to which employees are entitled; an employee who earns four weeks of vacation each year still would be eligible to take those four weeks in 2008, 2009 and beyond. The change would affect employees eligible for a payout of accrued vacation upon resignation of employment.

Severance: The Guild agreed to add “gross misconduct” as a basis for denying severance to terminated employees. The severance cap of 38 weeks remains unchanged.

Job security: The company agreed to no layoffs for 14 months, through December 31, 2008. Sick leave, short- and long-term disability: The current sick leave pool of 10 days annually, with a maximum bank of 20 days, would remain unchanged. The Guild agreed to replace existing short- and long-term disability policies with those offered to management. Those policies pay 70 percent for a qualifying short-term disability and 60 percent for a qualifying long-term disability. The company must supplement short-term disability for Guild-covered employees so that they receive 100 percent of pay for up to 120 days; thereafter, employees would receive 70 percent of pay for 60 days, and 60 percent thereafter.

The Guild bargaining committee included Julie Forster, unit chair Alex Friedrich, Meggen Lindsay and Jim Ragsdale of the newsroom; former unit chair Jack Sullivan of the newsroom (through August); Dave Noble of advertising; Lance Forys and Duane Maxson of circulation; and Marilyn Clements and Darren Carroll of the Guild office.

The committee has been supported throughout the process by three dozen Guild leaders and activists including Mara Gottfried, Cheryl Burch-Schoff, Tim Nelson, Dave Orrick, Fred Melo, Kelly Blaiser and more than 30 Guild contacts. All took part in an unprecedented level of preparation for bargaining.

It’s been quiet, too quiet on the local TV news front, so thought I’d check in at KSTP and WCCO to see what’s cooking with the stations’ respective searches for replacements to news directors Chris Berg (let go in early August) and Jeff Kiernan (resigned in early September). The responses were as different as the competitors’ approaches to news.

Hubbard Broadcasting VP/KSTP general manager Rob Hubbard said he’ll take his time finding a replacement for Berg at the ABC affiliate. Hubbard’s been so happy with former assistant news director Lindsay Radford’s interim performance that, “I didn’t even make a phone call” until Radford went out on maternity leave several weeks ago.

He called Radford a “solid candidate” for the position. Interim news director duties are now being handled by I-Team overseer Dana Benson, a former KSMP news director and WCCO news manager himself.

Hubbard said that Berg had done “a fantastic job bringing the station back to a newsy focus” [best illustrated by the station’s superlative bridge collapse coverage], but that he wanted Berg’s replacement to focus on adding more context to news stories.

Conversely, WCCO spokeswoman Kiki Rosatti said the CBS-owned station would have liked a replacement for Kiernan “last week.” In the interim, Kiernan’s duties are being handled by John Daenzer with assistance from Mike Kaputa. Rosatti said station general manager Susan Adams Loyd is “looking everywhere” for a replacement.

However, unlike Hubbard, WCCO wants someone who will “fit in with and improve” the existing news focus and structure, rather than change it.

The only names that have surfaced so far as potential WCCO replacements are former KSTP’ers Scott Libin (news director pre-Berg), now on the faculty at the Poynter Institute in Florida, and his former assistant Mark Ginther, currently assistant news director at WFAA in Dallas.

Friday was the last day that the Star Tribune offered readers with beefs the name and number of a real person who would listen to them. Here’s the new procedure, as described under the headline “Have a Concern?” as it ran in Saturday’s paper.

“The Star Tribune is committed to correcting errors that appear in the newspaper or online. Concerns about accuracy can be directed to corrections@startribune.com. You may also call the main number, 612-673-4414, weekdays between 8:30 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. and ask to be connected to the appropriate department. Contact information for editors can be found in each section of the newspaper.”

I wonder what poor bastard has been assigned the thankless task of sorting through the new corrections e-mail bin? It’s doubtful the task was considered a plum assignment. Then, about that “main number” folks are directed to call. In the good old days of the live switchboard, the one person answering that line into the newsroom already had his or her hands full for eight frickin’ hours a day. With no one bothering to use the new automated system, I’m sure the pressure has already increased exponentially. Now, add to that the reader’s rep overflow–which is considerable and populated with regulars who call as much to chat as to vent. Oy.

My favorite part was the final suggestion that concerned or disgruntled readers could contact the editors of various departments directly, only no specific phone numbers were listed, just the vague directive to search through the sections for contact information. These are folks whose voicemail picks up 24/7 because they’re up to their eyeballs 24/8. Some of these folks can’t even get back in timely fashion to their own staffers who call or email questions about breaking news stories. What chance does Joan Q. Public stand of getting a response while her question/concern/correction is still fresh?

With a reader’s rep, the paper–though management may have been cynical about it–at least gave the appearance of wanting to hear from its readers. This latest system strikes me as one big FU.

Andrew Zimmern loved the chance to talk on his WFMP radio show about subjects other than food, but in the end, his burgeoning success at the Travel Channel forced him to give it up, he said in an interview Thursday.
When the radio show launched on 107.1 FM four months ago, he said, “the Travel Channel thing [“Bizarre Foods”]was still fresh, I didn’t know whether the show would do well or even have a second season.”
However, Travel Channel now wants him to expand the “Bizarre Foods” concept and also “get me involved in new projects,” which he said he couldn’t discuss at present.
“Because of the success of [“Bizarre Foods”], it needed to be fed, not starved and it put me in a Catch 22 in terms of giving up what I really loved [being on the radio],” Zimmern said. “It’s not something I’m necessarily happy about. I held on to everything as long as I could.”
Zimmern, who says he’s now out of town “about two-fifths of the year” with his cable show, plans to continue on at 107 as a contributor “or a recurring guest” and will also continue his affiliation with Minneapolis/St.Paul magazine.
His weekend show, “Food Court,” will run until the end of October.

Got a call this evening from El Kayak, a.k.a. Lambert, as he stood outside the Pink Taco in Vegas, socks still damp from his Lake Powell adventure paddle. My colleague, however, was not all wet when it came to his scoop about fast rising cable TV star Andrew Zimmern, who is expected to announce during his radio show Thursday that he is leaving his weekday afternoon host post on WFMP (107.1 FM), the station we affectionately call “Chick Radio.”

Zimmern, who hosts the wildly successful Travel Channel show, “Bizarre Foods,” has been given another development deal at the channel, according to 107’s VP/general manager Dan Seeman, who was philosophical about Zimmern’s decision. “Everything is just exploding for him right now,” Seeman said Wednesday evening. “It was hard for us to compete with an international TV show.”

Seeman said that Zimmern will continue to contribute to the 1-3 p.m. talkfest, which posted good numbers with the noted local foodie at the helm (well, when he was at the helm, given his already busy travel schedule). The show will continue on with Zimmern’s sidekick, Colleen Kruse, in the driver’s seat. “She’ll be the center of the show and we hope Andrew will continue to contribute,” said Seeman, adding that the fate of Zimmern’s weekend radio show “Food Court,” is still unclear.

Ex-Stribber wanted to know why, if there are now two of us blogging, why there aren’t daily posts. As mentioned previously, my colleague Mr. Lambert is off kayaking in the wilds of Utah and is blameless. I was first out of town and am now deluged with out-of-town guests who want to see every piece of art the TC have to offer. So….haven’t been making a lot of calls. Fortunately, one of our correspondents had his ear to the ground and sent in this tidbit. I have no reason to doubt this post, as I was one of the folks who was told of her “reassignment” within days of the buyout deadline. Course, then they denied my buyout, but that’s a whole different story.

Read and discuss….

The Star Tribune Guild convened a 10:30 meeting this morning to look at a pattern of age discrimination in the reassignments cooked up by editors for the paper’s owner, Avista Capital Partners. Speaking on background, one Guild officer said that by their count “only three or four” of the [30-40] reporters told they are being reassigned, “are under the age of 35”.

It is generally considered “paranoid” or “cynical” to read individualized, strategic intent in these reassignment frenzies. But when, as the same Guild source points out, the percentage of reassignees is so heavily skewed to older writers AND they are notified of their reassignment only days/hours before they have to decide to accept a buy-out and leave the paper, you really aren’t left with many credible explanations other than that this is the latest exercise in the tried-and-true corporate “right-sizing” template of — let’s describe it the way it smells — — insulting/threatening a veteran reporter with a switch to a beat usually covered by a summer intern, if at all.

There are specific examples all over the place, but when you get to Neal Gendler, a 60-something with 40 years at the paper being reassigned to overnights from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m., you’re not even getting points for subtlety. In other words, police chase and flaming wreck with shoot out at 3 AM … Gendler’s your man.)

The Guild also has a problem with the peculiar sequencing of the reassignment/buy-out deadline process devised by the Star Tribune. As I asked/wrote yesterday, how else can you explain managing editors spending so much time re-mapping their employee universe BEFORE knowing for certain who they would have to work with, other than as a not too subtle and yes, fairly cynical process for “encouraging” those they most want out of the building to pack up and go?

It may be technically legal, but it runs contrary to the spirit of journalism, where your agendas, if you have them, are supposed to be plainly disclosed.

Whether the Guild alone can get any traction on the age discrimination issue remains to be seen. I happen to believe they should pursue aggressive outside counsel if only to squeeze Avista for a fatter, longer-term health benefits package. But that’s me and it wouldn’t be my money.

One of our correspondents the other day bemoaned our Strib coverage as appealing to “about 500 readers” and asked that we please write about something else. I hear you, brother (though I think the 500 number is WAY too high). I left the Strib because I didn’t want to think about it all the time and would much prefer to concentrate on other local media, but the management weasels over on Portland just won’t let up.
Arrived home from the North Shore Sunday night to find that the Strib’s longtime contact with the outside world–the reader’s representative–is the latest position to be whacked, or semi-whacked, depending on how you read the memo (posted below).
The paper’s ombudsman position, created in the late ’70s, was one of the first in the country. For years, Lou Gelfand handled the duties and was notable in his willingness to bite senior management’s hand when required. Kate Parry, who was imported from the Pioneer Press about three years ago, lacked Gelfand’s chutzpah during a time when those hands needed some serious gnawing. Well, at least she answered the phone. Now, with the switchboard operators gone and an Orwellian computerized phone system in place, and Parry reassigned as a health care editor, readers with issues are going to be hard-pressed to find someone to bitch to in the newsroom.
That’s where my esteemed colleague comes in. On the newsroom’s intranet communications board, one poster wondered if the new reader’s rep might be “Brian Lambert at the Rake.” I think that’s a great idea–I’d post his phone number right now, but he’s kayaking and can’t defend himself.
Here’s the memo and–hopefully–here’s the end of Strib news for a while:

From: “Rene Sanchez”
To:
Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2007 11:07:34 -0500
Subject: Kate Parry is our new Health Care Editor

Dear staff:

We’re pleased to announce that Kate Parry will be our new health care editor, taking on responsibility for coverage in print and on line. She will also occasionally serve as an at-large editor in the newsroom.

As you all know, we created one health care team to serve needs across the newsroom, including business, metro and features. This team has some of our most experienced reporters and writers, and we are looking to this team to produce some of our most ambitious journalism. In addition, we will need to expand our coverage online headed into 2008. We searched for several months for the right person to lead this coverage before coming to the conclusion that Kate had the best mix of skills for this important job. We know that she will provide thoughtful leadership and sophisticated editing; she has a long track record as an award-winning journalist.

When Kate came here nearly three years ago, it was with the understanding that the job of reader representative would not be a lifetime appointment and we discussed a tenure of about three years. I think we can all agree that Kate has served in that role admirably, and with courage. She has taken on some very difficult topics in her column, and spent hours listening to readers, and addressing the public. She has tackled prickly issues in the newsroom too, negotiating differences between writers and readers. We have been lucky to have her in that role.

But in a time of dwindling resources, we need more help with the journalism in the newsroom in order to serve our readers at the level they deserve.

We plan to keep the readers’rep position open while we evaluate our options although it’s likely that in the future this will be a part-time position. In the meantime, we hope to step up communication in other ways. We will, of course, continue to answer all readers calls and report significant issues to editors in the room. Department heads will be asked to take on responsibility for correcting errors in their sections. And newsroom leaders will be asked to increase communication with the public. I will be resuming the editor’s blog and the editor’s column that Anders started, and I will occasionally ask other top editors to share that responsibility. We will also take on more responsibility for outside speaking engagements to share with the public the work we are doing in the newsroom. I have done two in the last week alone.

Kate will start her new job Monday, Oct. 8. Since her work will cross all departments, she will report to Deputy Managing Editor Rene Sanchez. Please join us in thanking her for her work as the reader’s representative and wishing her well in this new role.

Nancy, Scott and Rene

I was covering the Larry Craig hearing for most of yesterday and, though I tried to keep the site refreshed by posting comments, memos and such, I didn’t have a chance to read through the entries until late last nigiht. They made me smile.
There were posts from some of the media people I respect most in this town, who offered viewpoints that were enlightening, entertaining, and irritating. There were posts from others I don’t know as well with fresh takes on old subjects, or who made comments with which I disagreed entirely. In short, this little blog offered a microcosm of what I like to get when I read a newspaper’s opinion pages.
That’s why interim Strib publisher Chris Harte’s memo to staff yesterday regarding the changes to come to the paper’s editorial pages left me feeling queasy.
The queasiness started with him naming Scott Gillespie editorial page editor “on an interim basis.”
Just last week, Harte named himself interim publisher while a “national search” is conducted to find a Par Ridder replacement. I saw no similar replacement strategy attached to the Gillespie appointment. Does that mean that by the time Scott has finished that assignment, there won’t be a need for an editorial page editor? I remember a time when the Pioneer Press had a sizeable, vibrant staff for its editorial pages. That disappeared with the paper’s downsizing and “localization” under Par Ridder, who Avista championed as its publisher until only recently.
Par may be gone, but “local” isn’t. It cropped up all over the Harte memo.
He sees the need for the paper to concentrate on “local, state and regional issues” (which I thought it already did) and I suspect that Harte agrees entirely with Ridder, who told a staffer during a recent meeting that he saw no need for the paper to endorse a presidential candidate, because it had no bearing locally.
Oops, there’s that sick feeling again.
It got worse when Harte mentioned that he has issued a “mandate” to Gillespie to move the editorial pages in a direction that “complements” the paper’s new strategy of locally zoning the metro pages. Readers who have complained consistently that the lefty editorial pages need “right-sizing” need to note this. Nobody is talking about a change in political slant; everything is just going to get smaller. I’m going to miss reading about issues that might be affecting an area other than my neighborhood. I thought that was what being part of a community was all about.
I didn’t always agree with Susan Albright, but I respected her fight to preserve the integrity of her section. And I respect her even more for choosing to walk away from her job, rather than become an administrator for implementing the “mandate” of a man who doesn’t even live here yet.