By: E&P Staff When Rocky Mountain News staffers gathered in the newsroom at noon Thursday, there were "more smiles than frowns" in anticipation of some sort of official announcement from top E.W. Scripps executives, according to the newspaper's own live coverage.
The announcement, of course, was bad news: The Rocky is folding with Friday's edition, two months before it would have marked its 150th anniversary.
"Mark Contreras (Scripps senior vice president of newspapers) says its ala talking to the kids explaining a divorce," wrote the uncredited staffer. "The passion and creativity of your work has captured imagination of everyone at Scripps; awards, Pulitzers, the rocky is always at the top of that list."
Scripps CEO Rich Boehne was asked by another journalist if the company considered a "different model to sustain" the paper.
"I honestly don't know," Boehne responded. "Can only work within the restraints that you have. Might have been a nice alternative to do something different with it. How long is it going to take to get ahead of the debt we have today? There was an enormous economic challenge just to get even. We have to protect the future of all the newspapers we have. We did not see anything economically viable."
Boehne said just one person showed interest in the paper, but later withdrew from bidding. "We were told this could take $50, $100 million just to stay in the game," Boehne added. "We couldn't do that."
The live coverage is posted at http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2009/feb/26/live-coverage-official-announcement-rocky/
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