The Roanoker’s upcoming March/April story on the emergence of online news sources in the Roanoke Valley and the demise of the daily paper has just gone to the printer and we have some important additional information that we can add here. Lee Enterprises, which owns The Roanoke Times and a number of other Virginia newspapers, as well as many others nationally, has apparently begun furloughing workers at its newspapers, asking for absences of two weeks without pay.
Lee’s other Virginia newspapers are based in Richmond, Charlottesville, Culpeper, Lynchburg, Fredericksburg, Martinsville and Bristol. Lee Enterprises also owns papers in Danville and Waynesboro.
Recently Lee announced internally that its editorial pages for all its Virginia newspapers would be produced in Richmond. That followed Times’ editorial page editor Mike Allen leaving for another job.
The Times’ editorial employees are represented by a union and according to an internal memo, the union will fight the furloughs. The memo said that union “contracts state that full time union members must be paid based on a 40-hour work week and that the 40 hours and pay cannot be reduced unless both the union and the company agree. Obviously, the union has no reason to agree to furloughs.”
The memo related that “some non-union employees said Lee is making some of them and most managers take furloughs. Apparently, of those affected, the furlough only applies to those making $19 an hour (or $39,520 a year) or more. Those who are being told of the furlough have two options: Take two weeks off without pay together or separately before Sept. 30 or keep working, but have two weeks’ pay divided by the remaining pay periods and subtracted from paychecks.” Those making six-figure salaries would be required to take five weeks off without pay, according to sources.
This is being done despite online subscriptions dramatically improving 30-40%, according to sources.
