Maine’s largest paper buried the lead in announcing the retirement of a top veteran editor whose exit comes in the wake of recent staff cutbacks.
To wit, John Richardson’s position as one of two managing editors is being abolished.
Richardson put in 35 years at the Portland Press Herald, most recently as one of two managing editors.
With his departure, Julia Arenstam will remain as the only managing editor, Executive Editor Carolyn Fox disclosed.
The cutback to one managing editor from two comes not long after the Maine Trust for Local News announced nearly 50 layoffs at the budget-challenged daily.
The trust, which bought a string of Maine papers in 2023, has also since seen several top managers quit.
Meanwhile, just two days after obliquely disclosing they were abolishing Richardson’s job, a group of Press Herald managers took to the airwaves to trumpet their great journalism.
Their claim, in so many words – as outlined for WMPG radio host and former Press Herald staffer Tom Bell – ‘we’re producing more journalism now, you just can’t tell.’
The reality: whether it’s on the web or in emailed newsletters, there’s substantially fewer stories and less reporting in the last year than even two years ago, roughly the time that’s transpired since the paper was bought out by the National Trust for Local News.
They can’t even fill a Monday e-edition with local stories – and some Mondays there are only a couple or three bylined stories. That includes sports.
That they are pumping out their local email “newsletters” means nothing when the volume of actual stories has cratered.
They’re trying to sell the idea that they’re actually producing more journalism digitally, that it’s not obvious since it’s just not in print.
Call it living in an alternate reality.
