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Dayton
Business Journal...
Cox
newspapers to consolidate
operations
by Ginger Christ
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
More
job cuts could be on the way for
Cox Media Group’s Dayton staff. That’s because the parent company of
the Dayton
Daily News could
eliminate another 40
positions if the company opts to centralize its copy editing process
elsewhere.
Lou
Grieco, president of the Dayton
Newspaper Guild and a DDN reporter for the past 18 years, said Cox is
still
deciding in which city it will consolidate the copy editing function
for four
markets — Dayton, Atlanta, Austin and Palm Beach, Fla. It is his
understanding
Dayton and Palm Beach are the most likely sites for the consolidation.
However,
Cox already has consolidated
most of its information technology and human resources services to
Atlanta,
where it operates the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
.
Calls
to Dayton Daily News’ management
seeking comment were not immediately returned.
Grieco
said management has said the
consolidation announcement most likely will happen by the end of
September or
beginning of October. The actual consolidation is expected to be
completed by
the end of 2012.
“It’s
a very tense time,” Grieco said.
Even
if Dayton is chosen as the winner
of the chain’s copy editing consolidation, Cox intends to lay off the
impacted
employees and rehire them under a different division.
Cox
already has consolidated copy
editing twice at the local level, centralizing all copy editing for its
regional daily and weekly papers, including the Springfield News-Sun
and the
Middletown Journal
, at its site at
1611 S. Main St.
The
potential layoffs would only
compound the job loss situation at the DDN, which on Aug. 26 announced
plans to
eliminate up to eight editorial positions, a move resulting in the
resignation
of the paper’s Pulitzer-winning photojournalist, Larry Price.
The
guild, which represents 113 copy
editors, reporters, photographers, editorial assistants and online
staff, has
not had a new contract since September 1986. Instead, employees have
worked
under “work rules” since 2008.
Cox’s
plan to centralize copy editing
is not new to the ever-shrinking journalism world. Last July, Gannett
Co. Inc.
announced its plans to create five
News Design Centers within two years at which designing and paginating
would be
completed for the entire chain. Gannett is the parent of the Cincinnati
Enquirer.
Read
it with links at the Dayton
Business Journal
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