As media cutbacks continue nationwide, staffers at two more Valley news outlets are being asked or forced to take unpaid time off to help their companies save money.
Employees at the Phoenix ABC affiliate, KNXV-TV (Channel 15), received a memo on Tuesday, asking them to take days off without pay or reduce the number of hours they work each week. Both options are voluntary. According to the memo obtained by Heat City, the request comes straight from Rich Boehne, the chief executive of the E.W. Scripps Company, which owns ABC 15.
The move comes a month after Scripps made mandatory budget cuts nationwide, reducing employee pay and ending contributions to retirement funds. At the time, Boehne said “these decisions were not taken lightly.”
Then just today, staffers at the East Valley Tribune newspaper in Mesa learned they have fewer options than their television counterparts. Publisher Julie Moreno told employees in a morning meeting that employees would be forced to take five unpaid days off between April 1 and June 30, according to a source who attended the meeting. Moreno described the tactic as a “preemptive strike” to avoid layoffs, the source said.
The cutback at the newspaper came down a few days after its parent company, Freedom Communications, was listed by Moody’s Investment Services as one of the top 238 companies likely to default on its loans. Moody’s so-called “Bottom Rung” list included just four other media companies.
This is the second round of cuts at the Tribune this year. The first in early January included layoffs of about 40 percent of its employees.
Full disclosure: I make regular, unpaid appearances on ABC 15 and am a former reporter for the Tribune.