April 6, 2009

New organization begins July 1
NEPA OKs merger with NENA

By Jennifer Skala
Bulletin Staff

It’s official. The New England Press Association and the New England Newspaper Association will merge to form one organization this summer.

NEPA members voted 309-2 to approve the merger, through mailed proxy ballots and votes at a meeting April 16 meeting in the office of Prince, Lobel, Glovsky & Tye LLP of Boston. The merger needed to be approved by two-third of those members eligible to vote, or 268 votes, to be approved.

“This vote represents the culmination of more than two years’ worth of meetings, discussions and hard work by the NEPA and NENA teams,” Brenda Reed, executive director of NEPA, told the e-Bulletin. MORE>

Forecast 2009 loss: $85 million
Globe closing threatened by parent
The parent company of The Boston Globe has threatened to close the Globe, by far the biggest newspaper in New England, if its unions don’t concede $20 million worth of saving by May 1.

Union leaders were told during a meeting April 2 that the Globe would lose $85 million this year unless deep spending cuts were put in play, the Globe reported the next day. The Globe reported that it lost an estimated $50 million in 2008.

Management representing the Globe and The New York Times Co., which owns the Globe, its Web site, Boston.com, the Telegram & Gazette of Worcester, Mass., and other media and related holdings in New England, told leaders of 13 unions about the shutdown threat during the 90-minute meeting, the Globe reported. MORE>

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Guard against government waste emerging from slop
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