Gateway Journalism Review

GateHouse cuts copy editors, adds centralized production hub

Two announcements from GateHouse Media draw attention to the newest trend used by media corporations to cut costs and consolidate production. On Jan. 18 the Illinois Times, an online newspaper covering Springfield, Ill., reported about staff reductions at the Springfield Journal-Register. (story) To cut costs, the story reported the Journal-Register would lay off up to a dozen copy editors and page designers over the course of the summer, and that the Journal-Register would send its copy to a central publishing desk outside of Springfield.

On Feb. 8 the Rockford Register Star announced that Rockford would hire 60 or more staff to work the new central desk to be housed in Rockford. All GateHouse Media newspapers with circulations more than 5,000 will be sent to the hub in Rockford. Newspapers with circulations of less than 5,000 will be sent to a hub in Framingham, Mass.

Lee Enterprises Uses Bankruptcy To Refinance

Lee Enterprises, the newspaper chain that owns 28 newspapers in the Gateway Journalism Review’s coverage area, including the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, was in and out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy within two months in a move to restructure its huge debt.

The action was aimed at forcing six percent of Lee’s creditors to go along with “an overwhelming majority of lenders,” (94 percent) Lee said it had on board to extend loan deadlines to 2015 and 2017.

The refinancing, effective Jan. 30, means Lee escaped an April 2012 deadline but will have to pay higher interest rates on about $1 billion in debt. The combined interest rates jumped from 5.1 percent to to 9.2 percent. Some Lee creditors will wind up owning 13 percent of the company.

Data journalism in St. Louis

Hundreds of journalists from around the world will convene at the St. Louis Union Station Marriott Feb. 23-26 to share strategies and discuss the latest trends in data journalism during Investigative Reporters & Editors’ annual Computer-Assisted Reporting Conference.

Missouri media questioning possible tollway

While most travelers in this area agree Missouri’s Interstate 70, the highway that connects St. Lou to Kansas City, is in dire need of repair, the issue of how to fund the repairs is being largely debated throughout the state. Missouri media are getting the story out. The problem is that readers must search multiple spots to find the entire story.

The proposal to install a toll road on the interstate, sponsored by State Sen. Mike Kehoe of Jefferson City, has been much publicized by media throughout the state, particularly in Kansas City. Kehoe has said the toll is the only way to fund repairs to a road that Transportation Department Director Kevin Keith predicts will resemble a “graveled parking lot” in 15 years.

Nepotism is nothing new in American politics

Liberals have for decades turned a collective blind eye when brothers Bobby, and especially Ted, so effortlessly fed off John F. Kennedy’s aura and jump-started their own political careers. And does anyone seriously think that “W” would have inhabited 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue had papa Bush not been there first? Today’s Republicans seldom mention the leg-up that father George Romney gave to his son Mitt. And few on either side of the political aisle touched the third-rail gender question of whether being First Wife really qualifies a person to be secretary of state for the world’s No. 1 superpower.