The Herald (Rock Hill) to eliminate 6 postions, cut wages

The The Herald in Rock Hill, S.C. will eliminate 6 positions and implement wage reductions, according to an email tip. Employees making more than $25,000 a year will receive a 2 1/2 percent pay cut. An official email from the publisher is expected later today.

UPDATE: Here is The Herald's report:

The Herald will eliminate positions, including some through layoffs, and reduce pay for most employees because of declining revenue and the deepening recession, the newspaper's publisher said today.

Six of the company's 95 employees will be affected by the staff reductions, Herald Publisher Debbie Abels said.

All employees making $25,000 or more will see salary reductions ranging from 2.5 to 10 percent, depending on their level of pay, Abels said.

The cuts are part of the McClatchy Co.'s plan to eliminate 15 percent of its workforce. The company said this morning that 1,600 positions will be cut in an effort to save more than $100 million.

The positions affected have not been announced. Those laid off will receive a severance package, Abels said.

The pay cuts will take effect April 13, Abels said. Employees' wages were frozen by the company last September for 12 months. Abels said that will continue for all of 2009.

In addition to staffing and salary reductions, The Herald is saving money by outsourcing the printing and distribution of the newspaper to its sister paper, The Charlotte Observer, and changing the format of its TV and entertainment sections.

The cost-control efforts come as McClatchy faces plunging ad revenues that are plaguing the entire publishing sector, as well as trying to recover $5.3 million owed by newspapers it had sold to companies that have recently filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

.