Sacked Santa Barbara Journos Take On Their Old Boss
For the past nine months, the ground beneath the Santa Barbara News-Press has been shaking as the owners and staff of the newspaper are involved a labor law dispute of epic proportions. Now, the newspaper’s former reporters have launched a site to directly compete with their nemesis ex-employer.
At the center of the scandal is News-Press owner and co-publisher Wendy McCaw, a millionaire heiress with some unconventional ideas about how newspapers should report the news. Read the details about her eccentric style guidelines and her kowtowing to a local celebrity in C.W. Nevius’ SFGate column from last year.
After months of infighting, the situation came to a head in February, 2007 when a group of News-Press journalists were fired during a labor rights scuffle. When the paper wouldn’t let the reporters unionize, they retaliated by hanging a huge sign from a freeway overpass during rush hour encouraging locals to cancel their subscriptions. McCaw sacked them.
Now, eight of the fired reporters have banded together to launch Santa Barbara Newsroom, a daily local news site that competes with the News-Press. The site, which was launched with assistance from the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, is powered by Joomla, an open-source content management system.
The reporters hope to win their jobs back in court — check out yesterday’s editorial, which serves as a mission statement of sorts — but it seems like their local coverage is strong enough to challenge the much larger and more well-known News-Press.
Tip of the hat to Phil G.!
