Knight Ridder: 'Good Newspapers, Bad Press'

By: Wayne Robins Can Knight Ridder's newspapers continue to shine? Or will the cuts aimed at bolstering the bottom line inevitably lead to journalistic decline?

That has been the industry's most contentious question since San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News Publisher Jay T. Harris resigned early this year rather than make the staff and coverage cuts he thought necessary to meet Knight Ridder profit targets.

Attempting to seize the public-relations initiative, the company recently distributed a "Quality Journalism Packet" to the media, to make the point that while cutbacks can be cruel, Knight Ridder's 32 newspapers still do top-notch work. "There's been so much criticism in the trade press, including Editor & Publisher, about the quality of our journalism that it was worth reminding people of the good work we do," said Polk Laffoon IV, Knight Ridder's vice president of corporate communications.

But Marvin Kalb, the former TV newsman who now serves as executive director for the Washington office of Harvard University's Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics, and Public Policy, sees a good news/bad news dichotomy in Knight Ridder's efforts to highlight its journalistic viability.

"It's a good thing that they feel the need to defend their product, and defend it on the basis of good journalism," Kalb said last week in a telephone interview. "But, given the specifics that affect Knight Ridder newspapers, a very legitimate question remains. I praise their adherence to quality journalism, but I question, with the priorities they have established, whether they will be able to continue that in the future."

Some say it's already too late. The Dec. 24 issue of Fortune carries a devastating critique of Chairman and CEO Tony Ridder's vision, and claims that former "jewels," such as The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Miami Herald, are now "second-rate broadsheets."

The "Quality Journalism Packet" tries to counter such judgments, with pages of awards its papers have won since 1995, a series on slavery in Sudan, and columns by stars Mitch Albom, Dave Barry, and Leonard Pitts Jr. "I suspect that some of the people who criticize us haven't taken the opportunity to read our newspapers over a period of time in order to form their own judgments," Laffoon said.

However, Laffoon would not address the impact of the company's bottom-line approach on newsroom morale at hard-hit papers such as the Akron (Ohio) Beacon Journal and the Grand Forks (N.D.) Herald. The latter won a Pulitzer Prize for public service in 1998, but Ridder-induced cuts have been so drastic that Herald Editor Mike Jacobs, who guided the Pulitzer-winning coverage, now has to double as county government reporter.