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SPEECHES, SPECIAL REPORTS AND MESSAGESTo Our Readers: The Times' Objective is Not Closure of the P-I, But Preservation
of The Times as a Local, Independent Newspaper The Seattle Times Company has worked hard on behalf of the P-I, and the agreement worked well for almost 20 years. But this is a different world today. The economy, demographics, lifestyles, technology and competition have changed. One result is a dramatic decrease in the number of daily newspapers and their share of advertising revenue. In today's world, the JOA model no longer works, putting The Seattle Times in jeopardy. Unless the JOA is modified to reflect today's realities, we expect continuing losses under the agreement. Our objective is not closure of the P-I, but preservation of The Seattle Times as an independent, local newspaper. We support the P-I but can't put our own survival at risk. In both our original and revised contract with The Hearst Corporation we negotiated an escape clause that set three consecutive years of losses as the measure that would enable either newspaper to seek a change in the JOA. After three years of financial losses, beginning with 2000, we attempted to negotiate with Hearst to modify the JOA. When those efforts failed, The Times made the decision that we needed to invoke the clause. Before the process could begin, The Hearst Corporation filed a lawsuit against us, challenging the basis of our financial losses. On one aspect of their challenge, the court recently ruled in favor of Hearst, disallowing the first year of losses because they were caused by a labor strike. This week, we announced that we will appeal the court's decision. The JOA Lawsuit Has Been Brought by the Multibillion-Dollar New York-Based Media Conglomerate, The Hearst Corporation, Against the Locally Owned Seattle Times Some have tried to characterize this as the powerful Seattle Times versus the underdog P-I. Nothing could be further from accurate. This is not a dispute between The Seattle Times and the P-I, but rather a dispute between the New York-based Hearst Corporation and the locally owned and independent Seattle Times. The Hearst Corporation is one of the largest media companies in the world. It has resources far more vast than ours. Local Newspaper Stewardship and Independent Journalism are At Risk The Seattle Times is a local family business with members of our family actively involved in its operation. We come to work every day and we live in the community. We donít have the resources of The Hearst Corporation, but we have been able to build an award-winning newspaper that is the number one choice of readers. We have done it by staying true to our mission of serving the community with fiercely independent journalism that focuses on the concerns of our readers. And by investing ourselves and our resources in making The Seattle Times the best regional newspaper in the country. To us, given the realities newspapers are facing across the country and here in Seattle, it comes down to a question of who will control your local newspaper and make decisions about what you read. Is Seattle better served by executives of a multibillion-dollar media conglomerate based in New York or local people who face many of the same problems you do everyday? We don't think concentration of media in the hands of a few powerful corporations is good for our communities. We are unusual in Seattle to still have an independent local newspaper that gives voice to our community. We think it would be fine if two daily metro newspapers could survive in Seattle. We have never ducked competition. But what is most important is preserving the locally owned newspaper. That can't happen if we are forced to continue absorbing losses under our JOA with The Hearst Corporation. Great fortunes have been made by media empires that consolidate ownership of radio, television and newspapers, but in the end it has been the consumers who have been harmed. We believe there should be more media voices, not fewer. But we can't change the economics that have led to one newspaper in most cities our size. What we can do is fight to keep a local newspaper in Seattle. Most of Seattle's media, and many of its other businesses, have lost local ownership. We feel a newspaper has a unique relationship with a community and it would be especially damaging to our region to have no locally owned daily metro newspaper. Thank You You, our readers, have made it clear through your choice of The Seattle Times that you value quality, independent journalism. You have made us one of the few newspapers across the country growing in circulation. For that, we thank you. If you have any questions about local ownership or about the JOA, we would like to hear from you. Please write to us. You can reach us by email at mycomments@seattletimes.com or by letter at PO Box 70, Seattle, WA 98111. We look forward to hearing from you. And, again, thank you for making The Seattle Times your newspaper.
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