Friday, November 23, 2007

Top three officials resign at GateHouse paper


The top three officials at GateHouse Media's State Journal Register in Springfield, Ill., resigned one week after the company offered voluntary buyouts to half of its staff:

In a memo e-mailed to State Journal-Register employees today, publisher Sue Schmitt said she, editor Barry Locher and managing editor Robert Pope were not asked to leave.

In excerpts of her memo published on the paper's Web site, Schmitt doesn't give a reason for the resignations. But she says they weren't because the three saw "something catastrophic just over the horizon."

The resignations come weeks after the newspaper offered a voluntary severance program to half its staff. It cited the need for flexibility as the newspaper adjusts to rapid changes in the industry.

GateHouse Media purchased the paper earlier this year and the severance offer was made last month.


GateHouse Media owns The Carthage Press, Neosho Daily News and numerous other Missouri publications, and recently purchased the Pittsburg Morning Sun.

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