"The affected employees are being briefed on this change now,'' the memo says. A staff meeting is set for at 5 p.m. ET at the Home News Tribune in East Brunswick. Two other N.J. papers are not included, the memo indicates.At each paper, the change affects the day desk, the night desk, the entertainment desk, the business desk, the sports desk, art and design, the memo says: "To lead this regional desk operation, Gannett is creating 16 new editing management positions in Neptune. These editors will be responsible for page production and editing for all of the daily and non-daily pages produced by the four newspapers.''
Copy editors and editors affected by the switch are being encouraged to apply for jobs on the new desk. Those who don't will be offered severance, the memo says.
The move will follow newspaper division chief Bob Dickey's recent remarks about a possible similar editing operation in the Indianapolis area to serve The Indianapolis Star, plus other metro papers and smaller dailies in the area. Gannett's 10 Wisconsin papers already share regional editing and other production work.
Please post your replies in the comments section, below. To e-mail confidentially, write gannettblog[at]gmail[dot-com]; see Tipsters Anonymous Policy in the green rail, upper right.[Today's Asbury Park front page, Newseum]
Will this resolve the building problems that the hard-hitting reporters are on the verge of disclosing?
ReplyDeleteJust another example that Gannett doesn't give a shit about quality.
ReplyDeleteAs the supposed "chief journalist" within Gannett, does Kate Marymont have a hand, or a yay or nay say-so, in such newsroom reorganization plans? Or is this strictly a beancounter scheme?
ReplyDeleteAll other papers take note: Stop making fun of NJ or this will happen to you too! We bitch because we've earned it.
ReplyDelete6.01 it depends on what YOU intend to do about it.Leave the reporters alone put up or shut up
ReplyDeleteYou know there's more pain at the Daily Record. All the editors except the EE were told they had to reapply for a job. 15 editors, 10 jobs. An especially evil game of musical chairs.
ReplyDeleteI don't see how this saves much money if all the copy editors save the chiefs are offered jobs in Asbury. And you're going to take away from local sports, one of the few reasons left why people read us?
The atmosphere is shock and sadness. It's only a matter of time before we disappear or are absorbed into Asbury.
6:36 -- You have enough pain just working under your horrendous EE every day!
ReplyDeleteSo who's at risk of losing their jobs? Any dead wood?
ReplyDeleteWhy wasn't Cherry Hill consolidated?
ReplyDelete9:40, the horrendous one is the former EE who's now a publisher
ReplyDeletethere's dead wood in the DR's EE office.
ReplyDeleteThe biggest crime is the Managing Editors job is in jeopardy. There's no one in that building that workds harder than the DR's ME.
I don't get the math. There are 16 "new" editing "management" jobs?
ReplyDeleteHow many total editors are affected and how many total jobs will there be to reapply for? Or are they saying there are 16 total jobs? Because, there are more than 16 editors at the APP alone already, if all those departments are combined, aren't there?
Dude, Binghamton-Ithaca-Elmira are doing something similar - announced much more quietly about 6 weeks ago. No shocker here that NJ will do similar.
ReplyDelete@12:03 I can confirm that it is going on in the Central NY group. I don't know when it is going to happen, though. I heard it was stalled because not enough copy editors were applying for jobs in Binghamton.
ReplyDelete11:35, I don't know what the total size is supposed to be, but the merged desk is supposed to be run by 16 "regional editors" and assistant editors to manage the multiple papers/sections/zones etc. Since this involves day desks and night desks, that could work out to be 1 manager and 1 assistant manager per paper for each shift.
ReplyDeleteThese "regional editor" positions are replacing the managerial positions each paper's desks now have, and according to the memo handed out, those current managers are "encouraged to apply" for the new positions. The memo adds later, "Managers who are not selected for these positions will be offered severance packages."
Trying to keep score.
ReplyDeleteIndy thinking about it? Done it?
NJ in the works.
NY already has some?
The copy desk is the heartbeat of the newspaper. Without these people every writer and editor is dead meat.
Is it just me, or is the feeling of dread overwhelming here?
Cherry Hill isn't on there probably because they'll combine with Wilmington. As maybe Vineland, too? And maybe Salisbury (Md.) ....
ReplyDelete