McClatchy newspaper editor: "We're down to seeds and stems"

Mike Tharp, new executive editor at the Merced Sun-Star, tells readers about the situation he finds himself in:

Our parent corporation, McClatchy Newspapers, has watched its stock fall like the rest of Wall Street-only sooner and further.

We've had to make unprecedented cutbacks-including, for the first time, and then the second, in the company's history -- layoffs. Or, as one typically cynical McClatchy reporter calls 'em, "cake days."

Even here at the Sun-Star, we lost people. The newsroom, my responsibility, is down to seeds and stems in terms of numbers of reporters, photographers, copy editors and sports writers.

Hat tip: Newspaper Death Watch