Guild OKs $4.8 Million Severance Settlement from Folded 'Rocky'

Posted Tuesday, April 28, 2009 12:00 am

By: E&P Staff Denver Newspaper Guild members who worked at the now-defunct Rocky Mountain News have unanimously approved a $4.8 million lump-sum severance payment.

Terms of the agreement with the paper's former owner E.W. Scripps Co. would pay out sums ranging from about $7,500 to a maximum of $50,000, the Denver Business Journal reported on its Web site Tuesday.

The severance package was reached after some two months of negotiations that saw Scripps open with an offer totaling $750,000, while the Guild countered with a request for $7 million. The Rocky closed Feb. 27.

"I think that's as much as we were going to get," Guild local chair Mel Pomponio told the Business Journal. "And we scratched out every dime we could get. They were not obligated to give us anything."

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Guild OKs $4.8 Million Severance Settlement from Folded 'Rocky'

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