By: E&P Staff The Seattle Times Co. said yesterday it plans to cut 90 to 110 full-time jobs. Employees affected by the staff reductions, which were not specified, will be notified by mid-February.
The Times Co. includes eight newspapers in Washington and Maine, as well as a printing plant and other operations.
The move, company officials said, is aimed at returning The Seattle Times, now embroiled in a joint operating agreement (JOA) fight, to profitability within two years. Times officials have said the newspaper lost $12 million last year, and also took losses in 2003.
The paper currently has about 1,500 fulltime employees.
In a memo circulated to Times staff members, Carolyn Kelly, the company's president and chief operating officer, said the company also expects to cut an undisclosed number of part-time workers, and leave other positons unfilled.
According to an article in the paper today, Steve Miletich, a Times reporter and vice president of the Pacific Northwest Newspaper Guild, which represents more than 700 employees at the Times, called the announcement a surprise and quite "sobering."
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