Day By Day

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Dinosaur Death Watch -- The Baltimore Sun

The Baltimore Sun moves closer to full extinction.

BALTIMORE (AP) -- The Baltimore Sun has laid off 61 people in its newsroom, about a quarter of its editorial staff, including veteran editors and managers, columnists, photographers and designers.

Maryland's largest newspaper laid off managerial employees at the end of the day Tuesday, and notified union-represented employees Wednesday afternoon, said Renee Mutchnik, a spokeswoman for the Baltimore Sun Media Group.

Twenty-one managers and 40 staffers represented by the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild were laid off, Mutchnik and union leaders said. The union cuts included one employee who volunteered to be laid off. The cuts represent about 27 percent of the newsroom staff at The Sun, which is owned by Chicago-based Tribune Co.

Among the managers who lost their jobs were one of the deputy managing editors, the opinion page editor, the op-ed editor and the copy desk chief. Many had decades of experience at The Sun.

Read the whole thing here.