Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Anchorage Daily News closes Juneau bureau

McClatchy's Anchorage Daily News is closing its Juneau bureau and scaling back its print version:


As its parent company struggles to stay afloat, the Anchorage Daily News is shutting down its Juneau bureau and again scaling back its print version, managers told employees last week. The cutbacks come on top of dozens of layoffs, wage freezes and other attempts this year to trim expenses, such as reducing reimbursements on cell phone charges to reporters.

McClatchy Co, the owner of the Anchorage Daily News, is suffering from a mountain of debt and a weak stock price. The company is now looking to sell one of its prized assets, The Miami Herald, according to The New York Times.

“The bid to sell The Herald continues the fallout from McClatchy's $4.5 billion purchase in 2006 of Knight Ridder, the newspaper chain that had owned the Miami paper,” according to The Times article. “Largely as a result of that deal, one of the biggest in the industry’s history, the company has about $2 billion in debt, payments on which eat up much of its cash flow.”

For Alaskans, the Herald’s potential sale raises questions if McClatchy will offload more papers, including the Anchorage Daily News. In the business community, some have speculated the state’s largest newspaper will eventually be sold, and perhaps an Alaska-based company, such as a Native corporation, will buy it up. The Daily News and McClatchy have given no sign they plan to sell the paper.

Hat tip: Fading to Black
.
Previous:

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

An absolute disgrace. A newspaper that pretends to speak for Alaska that now has no representation in the state's capital. We need to find someone like the Atwood family, who had a vision for coverage of Alaska, and not this puny, scaled-back shadow of a newspaper not fit even for wrapping eels.

Anonymous said...

ADN article heading about Gov. Palin:
"From mayor of a town with less than 9,000 people, to vice presidential candidate, Gov. Sarah Palin's has the country's attention."
----------
I guess they didn't want to mention her experience as governor. Now why would that be?

ADA’s article, ‘Palin pressured Wasilla librarian’ was highlighted as outright yellow journalism by scrupled journalists. I hope the 80% of Alaskans that support Gov. Palin cancel their subscription to this fraud, fish wrap, waste of ink.
You can read the article if you haven’t eaten recently.
http://www.adn.com/sarah-palin/story/515512.html

Anonymous said...

Amen