From a story Saturday about a fitness club's plans to buy The Journal News building in Westchester, N.Y.:
The 38-year-old Journal News building has been for sale for more than a year, following a downsizing trend that left the newspaper building at about a third of its potential occupancy.
Gannett is looking for new space to lease to house what's left of the newspaper's staff. The press was shuttered in March 2010, when printing was shifted to a non-GCI site in Rockaway, N.J.
The 38-year-old Journal News building has been for sale for more than a year, following a downsizing trend that left the newspaper building at about a third of its potential occupancy.
Gannett is looking for new space to lease to house what's left of the newspaper's staff. The press was shuttered in March 2010, when printing was shifted to a non-GCI site in Rockaway, N.J.
Nice story except for one detail: where will the remaining Journal News staff be relocated....No one knows right now, but I'd suspect that another "downsizing" will result from the move and not just the copy editors/page designers being swallowed by the so-called design studio in Asbury Park....We'll see.
ReplyDeleteThe space between Jim's ears has been vacant for a few years now. He gets the stray insane impulse, but that's about it.
ReplyDeleteThank you Mike Fisch for running our newspaper into the ground. What a shame.
ReplyDeleteSad news for Westchester. I can only imagine what could occupy Crystal Palace in time to come.
ReplyDeleteGiven how this company is hell-bent on cutting expenses, I would not be surprised to hear there is no new office and the staff is expected to workk from their homes in the future.
ReplyDeleteThe Journal News was gasping for air long before Fisch. People can blame Sherlock, Freeman, and schmucks like photo "guru" Larry what's his name, and sure, they all contributed in their own way.
ReplyDeleteNow you've got C.R. - the blind leading the blind - but all of their ineptitude came together at a time of declining circulation, the Internet advertising migration, etc., etc.
Yep, resources could have been better used - getting more production out of more reporters would have been nice - and it also might have helped if corporate had invested in the operation instead of feathering the nest of an unneeded VP News position.
Unfortuately, corporate is well aware of what the Journal News has become: a wafer-thin, wire-service filled paper that's more irrelevant with each passing day. And corporate couldn't care less.
It's a sad state of affairs for the community, not just the employees who have been left behind.
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ReplyDeletePut the entire company in the arrogantly lavish and increasingly vacant Crystal Palace. That place ranks right up there with the most obnoxiously lavish, under-used buildings ever built! And to pay for it, how many Gannettoids across the country and in Tysons, Va., had to lose their jobs? Shame on you Gannett.
ReplyDeleteA lot of bucks from Westchester and other community papers have been sucked into corporate troughs for years.
ReplyDeleteG A N N E T T has suffered under the hands of short-sighted executives and now under a bunch of bumblers who are inept except when it comes to filling their own pockets.
ANONYMOUS SAID. WESTCHESTER SITE PLEASE DON'T JUST BLAME M. FISCH. THEY IS ENOUGH BLAME TO GO AROUND STARTING WITH CORPORATE.
ReplyDelete"Unfortuately, corporate is well aware of what the Journal News has become: a wafer-thin, wire-service filled paper that's more irrelevant with each passing day. And corporate couldn't care less."
ReplyDeleteThis is the story of every paper Gannett touches. This company is nothing but a giant leech
By early 2009 our Gannett site had so many empty cubicles I could hear the theme music from "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly" echoing through the empty spaces. Cue the tumbling tumbleweeds. www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hYV-JSjpyU
ReplyDeleteI'd like to see Crystal Palace turned into a homeless shelter. How's that for you, Gracia?
ReplyDeleteWestchester has been on a demise long before M. Fisch. Fisch could not save the paper as the continued cost reductions were forced upon from corporate. Gannett should be looking to Michael Kane who developed the strategy of "The Journal News" which has lead to the pathetic readership the paper current has. T. D. is also one of the many culprits to the problems that exist - since he was the publisher and VP of sales during much of the decline. C.R. needs to check her attitude at the door - hard to believe a prima donna such as her can continue to lead a staff of great journalists...but I guess it all in who you keep company with.
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ReplyDeleteanonymous said...westchester site tony simmons the heir apparent to be the Pubilher. who I thought would be next in line. not so fast after has last bone head move. I think corporate has second thought's about him. the last move he made was not thought out. with yes people all around him no wonder why the numbers are DROPING AND DROPING AN DROPING.
ReplyDeleteIn response to the comment about M. Kane in 6:39, it was not his decision to move the paper under one masthead. If you were there, you would realize that it was essentially the same paper (westchester/putnam) running w/ 9 editions with the only variable being some zoned news pages. The community KNEW it was the same paper everywhere they picked it up. And the expense and efficiencies to added editorial deadlines made perfectly solid sense at the time. AND, if you look at the circulation after the change, you would see that the move did not cause folks to shift away from the paper (more than any other paper in the country). I certainly view this as a forum for discussion but if you have no idea what you are talking about, please save your conjecture for other blogs.....stick to the actual facts and not "what you think" and this blog will be much more beneficial to all.
ReplyDeleteOur paper has closed two bureaus in the last year. Shrinking presence in a growing state. That should get somebody a bonus, right?
ReplyDeleteP:37 So true. 6:39 p.m.'s comments sound exactly like those spread around by the former ad v.p. Maybe she should have spent more time trying to help us sell ads instead of rewriting history. She sure did put some energy in those pajama party rallies though.
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