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Leave it to the cost-cutters at MediaNews to try to sell their East Bay readerships a newspaper makeover that will improve the quality of journalism with fewer journalists.

Last week, local management sent its employees — well, those who survived the recent buyout purge — at the company's 23 East Bay newspapers, which include The Contra Costa Times and the Oakland Tribune, a memo detailing a bold restructuring plan.

According to the March 12 memo, the key feature of the so-called "NewPaper Project" will be a task force of newsroom employees who will ask a series of fundamental questions about journalism in order to design an "innovative newspaper blueprint." The task force will question such elements as design, coverage priorities, and the breadth of coverage areas. In the memo, Kevin Keane, the executive editor of the Bay Area News Group (BANG), MediaNews' local consortium of papers, said he expected to roll out the NewPaper makeover by the end of the year.

While most employees are eager to reinvent the noble trade of newsgathering, some say the project's jingly title causes confusion and raises its own questions: Will NewPaper be softer, more absorbent ... quilted, perhaps?

The NewPaper concept comes at a time when BANG is downsizing.

But despite the recent shedding of 107 employees at the BANG papers — including 53 newsroom positions at the dailies — Keane's memo insisted that they will be able to improve quality with less. "What we did before was very good, but we can be better," wrote Keane, who did not return phone calls.

One veteran Trib reporter says it's nice that management is making an effort to include the rank-and-file in the process, but she has experienced these question-driven retooling efforts before. "What you do is replace all the question marks with periods, and then you know what they are planning to do," she says.

Using that formula, we can look at some of the NewPaper questions and get a good idea of what to expect:

• "What are our story priorities?" Translation: We're going to rewrite more press releases.

• "Do we develop a more professionally trained and reliable network of freelancers?" Translation: We're going to publish more stories written by unpaid journalism students.

• "What elements of design should we embrace?" Translation: Expect to see garish ads on the front page.

Write Your Comment show comments (4)

  1. John G. wrote, in part:
    *****
    "What are our story priorities?" Translation: We're going to rewrite more press releases.
    *****

    John, thanks for setting us straight about how we East Bay reporters will go about our business in the coming months and years. That was very insightful.

    All we're going to do, apparently, with the 15 percent reduction in the newsroom work force, is to sit on our behinds waiting for a press release to come in so we can regurgitate it.

    I guess none of us will spend any time finding enterprise stories to write about, or drilling down into the news of the day to find a good angle on a story.

    I guess unionized reporters are the only ones who know how to hit the pavement or burn up the phone lines or work their sources to dig up enterprise stories. Maybe that was some other Contra Costa Newspapers company that was winning a bunch of awards the last decade. And we were winning awards in Business, Metro, Sports and Features without anybody from the Newspaper Guild having to hold our hands and tell us how to do it.

    -George (yeah, that one)

    Comment by George Avalos — March 21, 2008 @ 10:10AM

  2. I think that was SPOT ON, and we all know it's true. And don't forget making editions common. People in Fremont and El Cerrito, even Oakley are going to love to what the Walnut Creek city council is up to. And MediaNews has a history of pushing unusable copy on the papers by 'mentored' UC students.
    Wake up, George. Don't know what dreamland you're in, but believe me, stay asleep. It's ugly in the real dimension. (By the way, I'm beginning to have serious concerns about your obsession with John Geluardi and Josh Richman. Maybe you should see somebody about that.)

    Comment by happyworker — March 22, 2008 @ 12:45AM

  3. Be nice to George, please. He is one of our best reporters.

    And he’s absolutely correct that employees of the former Contra Costa Newspapers have, over the years, produced an impressive array of award-winning journalism.

    But in my experience, great work usually stems from a team effort. As a reporter, I can throw myself into a story, but I also need backup from my news organization including time to report, space in the paper, and copy-editors to double-check for typos and errors.

    I worry about all those things these days. And I worry that some of our most talented coworkers are getting discouraged and want to leave. I believe organizing a newsroom union is our best bet to maintain reasonable working conditions and retain some of the really smart people who still work here.

    Find out more at www.onebigbang.org

    Sara Steffens

    Comment by Sara Steffens — March 24, 2008 @ 01:10PM

  4. *****
    I think that was SPOT ON, and we all know it's true. And don't forget making editions common. People in Fremont and El Cerrito, even Oakley are going to love to what the Walnut Creek city council is up to. And MediaNews has a history of pushing unusable copy on the papers by 'mentored' UC students.
    Wake up, George. Don't know what dreamland you're in, but believe me, stay asleep. It's ugly in the real dimension. (By the way, I'm beginning to have serious concerns about your obsession with John Geluardi and Josh Richman. Maybe you should see somebody about that.)

    Comment by happyworker — March 22, 2008 @ 12:45AM
    *****
    Wow, happy worker. Nice strawman argument about an obsession.

    Would it not be more productive to deal directly with my contentions?

    When did I mention, in this thread, Josh Richman? And I'm not supposed to use John Geluardi's name? He *wrote* the article!

    So how about some specifics, my anonymous friend? How am I in dreamland? Did the non-union CCN not win all those awards? Was that the dreamworld you're talking about?

    If I have some waking up to do, why don't you set me straight?

    -George

    Comment by George Avalos — March 25, 2008 @ 03:18PM

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