Audio By Carbonatix
Keep Phoenix New Times Free
We’re aiming to raise $10,000 by April 26. Your support ensures New Times can continue watching out for you and our community. No paywall. Always accessible. Daily online and weekly in print.
Freedom Communications, which publishes the East Valley Tribune, will slash pay by 5 percent for all employees, the company announced.
The move is a bitter pill for Tribune employees to swallow, coming after a recent, mandatory five-day furlough, reduced coverage and January’s layoff of 40 percent of the staff. But at least the paper is still chugging along [and if you haven’t heard, it won a Pulitzer this year].
The latest move doesn’t bode well for the parent company, Freedom, which is struggling to pay off $700 million in debt it assumed a few years back. Editor and Publisher magazine notes that the pay cut comes just two weeks after interim CEO Burl Osborne took command. [Former Freedom CEO Scott Flanders bailed recently for a gig as Playboy’s CEO, but even that venerable publication has been on rocky ground].
