In a Dec. 3 cover story in Metro Santa Cruz, former Santa Cruz Sentinel editor Tom Honig dissects the MediaNews business model, urging the company to build on existing talent. He writes:

There are still outstanding journalists at every newspaper in Northern California, particularly at the San Jose Mercury News and at the Oakland Tribune. An alert and creative MediaNews management team could put down their budget books long enough to establish a training program using the talent already in their organization…

Alas, don’t expect MediaNews to establish such a training program. Instead, their management has publicly discussed the idea of outsourcing some reporting and editing jobs to India. At the least, I expect that upcoming budget moves might include further cuts to the Sentinel’s production staff and moving the tasks of headline writing and copy editing over to a universal copy desk in San Jose. Ugh.

Read the rest.

Weekly update, Oct. 22: We hope to see all of you at this weekend’s membership meeting, where we plan to discuss several important bargaining issues.

The meeting begins at 11 a.m. Saturday Oct. 25, at the CWA Hall, 1831 Park Blvd. Oakland. Please enter the hall through the back entrance, off the parking lot.

MEETING AGENDA

1. Call to order
2. Update on Unfair Labor Practice case
3. Organizing committee update
4. Bargaining update
5. Discussion of vacation scheduling
6. Discussion of seniority: What role should it play in our job-security negotiations
7. New business
8. Upcoming meetings
9. Adjourn

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Oct. 21, 2008
JOINT STATEMENT:
Northern California Media Workers Guild
Southern California Media Guild/Local 9400
San Jose Newspaper Guild

A MediaNews proposal to wipe out copy desks at newspapers across the country threatens not only hundreds of jobs, but also quality and credibility – values the beleaguered newspaper industry needs now more than ever, Guild-represented newsroom workers at the company’s California newspapers said Tuesday.

Dean Singleton, CEO of the Denver, Colo., chain, disclosed to a publishers’ group in Florida on Monday that MediaNews management is looking to combine all its news desks into one or more consolidated copy-editing centers at locations yet to be named – possibly overseas.

The company’s holdings include 54 dailies in 11 states. Its California Guild-covered papers include the San Jose Mercury News, Contra Costa Times, Oakland Tribune, Long Beach Press-Telegram and Los Angeles Daily News.

“One thing we’re exploring is having one news desk for all of our newspapers in MediaNews … maybe even offshore,” Singleton said during his speech, according to an account by the Associated Press.

The speech was the first most MediaNews employees had heard of the idea. There has been no mention of moving to a single national copy desk during current contract negotiations at two of our biggest bargaining units, the Long Beach Press Telegram and Bay Area News Group-East Bay.

“We understand the need for newsrooms to operate more efficiently in tough economic times,” said Sara Steffens, chair of the BANG-EB bargaining unit. “But outsourcing copy-editors is a terrible idea. The move would damage beyond repair the things readers and advertisers value most about newspapers: Our wealth of local knowledge, and our commitment to accuracy and fact-checking.”

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