'Sun' Newsroom to Trib's FitzSimons: Keep Up Quality or Sell

By: Members of the union that represents newsroom staff of The (Baltimore) Sun asked Tribune Co.'s CEO Dennis J. FitzSimons on Tuesday to either make sure the newspaper gets the resources it needs to maintain quality or "sell The Sun to someone who will."

FitzSimons attended a forum in Baltimore with members of the newspaper's staff to talk about possible changes amid plans for the company to overhaul itself by year's end.

The Sun has been owned by the Chicago-based company since 2000. Tribune is also the parent company of the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Cubs.

"We ask that Tribune treat those of us who work here with the respect we deserve and make sure that The Sun has the resources it needs to maintain the quality that has allowed it to thrive," members of The Sun's unit of the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild told FitzSimons in a letter they presented at the meeting. "Either that, or sell The Sun to someone who will."

Gary Weitman, a Tribune spokesman, did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

FitzSimons spoke for about 20 minutes and then answered questions from employees for about 40 minutes, said Michael Hill, a longtime Sun reporter and chairman of The Sun unit of the union.

Hill said FitzSimons reviewed possible scenarios of the company's future that have been discussed recently in news reports, but Hill declined to detail them.

Tribune has been discussing a broad restructuring of the company. The company has faced unrest at its biggest newspaper, the Los Angeles Times, where the publisher and editor have refused to implement corporate-mandated cost cuts.

The guild unit represents more than 600 Sun employees in the news, advertising, finance, circulation, marketing, building and information systems departments, according to its Web site.