Akron Beacon Journal cuts 25% of newsroom staff

Beacon Journal cuts newsroom staff 4:21 p.m. (updated 5:02 p.m.) The Akron Beacon Journal today said it's laying off 40 people in its 161-person newsroom. Twenty-nine of those positions are full-time. Employees were given 60 days' notice and will receive severance pay amounting to one week's pay for every six months of service. A representative of the Newspaper Guild/Communications Workers of America, the newsroom union, said the list shows two artists, four photographers, eight copy editors, 11 reporters and four nonunion managers, as well as a librarian, three clerks and all seven student correspondents. That list includes pop music critic Malcolm X Abram and movie critic George Thomas. The Akron paper plans to announce more layoffs throughout the rest of the building, in departments such as accounting and circulation, in the next few weeks. The Beacon employs about 710 people. With the breakup of the Knight-Ridder newspaper group, the Beacon Journal was sold earlier this year to Black Press Ltd. from Poynter.org 5:02 PM 8/22/06

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