Tag Archives: Black Press Ltd

Previewing the auction of the remnants of the Honolulu Advertiser

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AuctionWe stopped by today to take a look at what is being offered for sale in Saturday’s auction of the remains of the Honolulu Advertiser.

Frankly, walking through the building that formerly housed both the Advertiser and the Honolulu Star-Bulletin during the years of their joint operating agreement was sad.

What’s left–lots of used cubicles, chairs, file cabinets, miscellaneous office equipment, most of it dated, a few bits of memorabilia, and memories.

There were a few abandoned awards for past journalistic accomplishments on the counter downstairs just inside the front door. A bulletin board formerly claimed by the Newspaper Guild. Empty shelves and cabinets in what used to be the library and archive.

Items are going to be sold in relatively large lots, and a lot of post-sale bartering is expected, according to auctioneer Joe Teipel.

You can bid on a room full of stuff and just take what you want, then either try to sell what’s left or just walk away. In that case, whatever is left will be sold at a big discount to a buyer committed to any remainders, Teipel said.

In any case, click on this photo to follow our tour through

Meanwhile, back at the Star-Advertiser

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It was officially announced yesterday that Ben Wood, Helen Altonn and Mary Adamski are leaving the newspaper as of July 30 after agreeing to voluntary buyouts that are said to include the maximum severance called for in the Guild contract.

I’m told Frank Bridgewater pointed out that between the three, they have more than 150 years combined experience.

“Our loss,” says one friend in the newsroom.

Earlier, I received this comment/complaint from a Starvertiser staffer.

Some lower management types were put back in the union, but now have one day — one day! — seniority over the Advertiser hires. They weren’t given a choice. So some people who have been here more than a decade are now technically only been here five weeks. Earlier, some people were made management (without any managing duties) simply to make them easier to dispose of.

And a proposal to merge the Hawaii Newspaper Guild with a number of other bargaining units has been moving forward.

Members of the Executive Committee of the Media Workers Guild endorsed a merger outline Saturday that could create a powerhouse communications local in the West, uniting the San Francisco-based Guild, the Hawaii Newspaper Guild and Oakland-based CWA Local 9415.

The tentative outline suggests the merged local be called the Pacific Communications and Media Guild. It would be a diverse alliance, one of the largest in the CWA, with more than 5,000 members drawn from industries including newspapers, language services, broadcasting, cable TV and regional, long-distance and cellular telephone service.

The units involved: Hawaii Newspapers (three bargaining units), Hearst (San Francisco Chronicle and SFGate), MediaNews Group (three bargaining units), McClatchy Newspapers (three bargaining units), California Federation of Interpreters (four regions), Printing Trades (multiple units), Guild Freelancers, New Media (online news and nonprofits), Radio and TV (KPFA), Cable Communications (Comcast), Telephone (Bell legacy), Long-Distance (AT&T), Mobile Communications, Manufacturing, etc.

And, speaking of California, former Advertiser & Star-Bulletin reporter Rick Daysog certainly hit the ground running in his new job at the Sacramento Bee. Check out his rapidly growing story list.

Monday…Burglary makes the news, Star-Bulletin owner’s debt ratings lowered

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Andy Parx over on Kauai called my attention to this little snippet in yesterday’s Star-Bulletin reporting, albeit briefly, on the outcome of our burglary story.

With the cutbacks and layoffs at Gannett’s Honolulu Advertiser, a lingering question has been how things are going down the street at the Star-Bulletin, owned by David Black’s Victoria, B.C.-based Black Press. It seems Black Press has run into the same financial storm as the rest of the industry, according to a series of downgrades of its outstanding debt by rating agency Standard & Poors.

On Jan. 23, 2009, Standard&Poor’s Ratings Services lowered its ratings on Black Press Ltd.’s senior secured bank financing (a C$55 million revolving credit facility, a C$63 million term loan A, a US$25 million term loan A-1, a US$140 million term loan B-1, and a US$85 million term loan B-2). We also revised the recovery ratings. We lowered the ratings on the senior secured bank facilities two notches to ‘B’ from ‘BB-‘ (the same as the corporate credit rating on Black Press). We also revised the recovery rating on the secured debt to ‘3’ from ‘2’, indicating our opinion as to an expected meaningful (50%-70%) recovery in the event of a payment default.

An Editor & Publisher blog cited S&P’s concern about Black’s debt stemming from his 2006 purchase of the Akron Beacon Journal, and quoted another part of the S&P report:

“The downgrade reflects our view of Black Press’ weakened credit protection measures and reduced financial flexibility stemming from lower EBITDA and higher debt levels,” Toronto-based S&P credit analyst Lori Harris said in a note.“Furthermore, we believe the impact of lower profitability and higher debt levels has resulted in the tightening of financial covenants. While management is taking steps to strengthen its operations and liquidity position, we believe that Black Press will remain challenged in fiscal 2010, largely because of difficult industry conditions.”

And how all this will trickle down into the Star-Bulletin newsroom remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, Sean Hao’s story in Sunday’s Advertiser on the companies receiving Act 221 tax credits is definitely worth checking out.

Still University of Hawai’i economics professor Sumner La Croix said the state should suspend the program because the costs far exceed the benefits.

“During these tough times this is the perfect place for the state to be cutting back,” said La Croix, who’s working on a study of the credits for the UH Economic Research Organization. “Yes we would lose a few more jobs, but these are jobs that are incredibly expensive. After looking at the companies that are receiving the (benefits of the) credit, I don’t see the spillover benefits on the rest of the community.”

Unfortunately, many companies now benefiting from the credits may not be sustainable without them, La Croix said.

“This is an industry that’s being built on foundations of sand,” he said.

Maybe newspapers need to declare themselves very high tech and get in on these tax credits before the program disappears.

But it’s hard to see how the tax credit program can survive this legislative session in its current form.