LA Times 4 Sale? Things 'a Brewin'! (Crossing Fingers Geffen Will Buy LA Times)

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Tribune, Chandlers May Be Near Deal to Unwind Partnerships
The assets have been at the center of the family's battle with the company, which owns The Times.
From the Chicago Tribune

September 15, 2006

Tribune Co. and California's Chandler family are close to unwinding two controversial partnerships at the heart of a boardroom battle that has roiled the company since early June, several sources close to the situation said.

After several weeks of "constructive" discussions, sources said Tribune Chairman Dennis FitzSimons and his team spent much of Tuesday and Wednesday trying to hammer out a solution with Los Angeles attorney William Stinehart, one of three Tribune board members representing the interests of the Chandler family, the former owner of the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago-based company's largest shareholder.

Spokesmen for both the Chandlers and Tribune declined to comment on the meetings or the shape of the partnership discussions. But sources close to the situation said the hope has been to reach a resolution before a Tribune board meeting slated for next week.

The two partnerships, formed in the late 1990s, allowed the Chandlers to diversify their newspaper holdings through a tax-free swap of family stock for company assets. However, the partnerships had to stay intact for seven years to preserve the tax benefits. Tribune inherited its stake in the partnerships as part of its $8.2-billion acquisition in 2000 of Times Mirror Co., the parent of The Times.

Tribune and the Chandlers have been negotiating to unwind the partnerships, which this month are both 7 years old. But talks have stumbled over several issues, including the valuation of preferred stock in the partnerships and a tax liability of about $70 million that Tribune would incur.

Whether unwinding the partnerships would quiet the Chandlers, however, is unclear.

The Chandlers have loudly criticized Tribune management for letting the stock — which closed Thursday unchanged, at $31.25 a share — drop from its high of more than $52 a share two years ago. A source close to the family said the Chandlers were still most interested in seeing their Tribune assets appreciate.

This summer, the Chandlers opposed Tribune's proposal to launch a $2.5-billion leveraged stock buyback to boost the sagging stock price, afraid that the debt the company would take on to buy the shares would upset valuations in the partnerships.

The family has its own ideas for boosting the stock, including a tax-free spinoff of television stations. Such a spinoff would be possible under complex tax rules once the partnerships were unwound. Another option: selling the Los Angeles Times.

The showdown between the Chandlers and Tribune, and the prospect that the company could be broken up or taken over, has attracted new investors to the stock. A hedge fund run by activist shareholder Nelson Peltz accumulated a 1.2% stake in Tribune during the second quarter. Peltz recently launched a proxy battle at H.J. Heinz Co. and won two board seats.

More quietly, Davidson Kempner Capital Management, which specializes in buying stock in troubled companies or those undergoing big changes, bought a 1.45% stake in the second quarter.

[Buckeye Native 001]

Good riddance to the Tribune owners. Now begins the long process of re-establishing the Los Angeles Times as the premier newspaper on the West Coast. As of right now, its nothing more than toilet paper.

[PDXPaul]

West Coast competition... like the chron? I think we're plagued with toilet papers on the west coast.

The LATimes needs to reestablish itself up there with the NYTimes and Washpost.

[DJM19]

Well they are kinda just different papers. I think the LA Times is more local news oriented.

[Vangelist]

The LATimes needs to reestablish itself up there with the NYTimes and Washpost.<<

Actually, judging by the number of Pulitzers and um, national journalistic controversies and scandals, the LA Times is on way healthier, more respectable ground than the NYT since the beginning of this decade. Now, readership, that's a different thing...than prestige.

[bjornson]

On another note: LA Times used to have a international coverage section (for national), but that didn't do too well so they got rid of it.

[SunMonTueWedThuFriSa]

Good riddance to the Tribune owners. Now begins the long process of re-establishing the Los Angeles Times as the premier newspaper on the West Coast. As of right now, its nothing more than toilet paper.

You honestly think a pulizter prize winning paper as toilet paper?

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Geffen was quoted as saying that if he bought the LA Times he would want to reassert it as a well regarded National paper. At first, I was for Eli Broad buying it, but since Geffen said he is actually in FAVOR of it becoming NATIONAL, I support Geffen's bid.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Only the NYT and WashPost have more Pulitzer Prize winners than LA TIMES. I don't understand why there is even any doubt LA Times is as well regarded as it is.

[edluva]

You honestly think a pulizter prize winning paper as toilet paper?

It's true the LAT's recent history is highly decorated. But I'd agree with Buckeye Native, *as of now* it's toilet paper. In the few years it's owned it, Tribune has really laid ruin to the Times. The LAT has lost many of it's most celebrated writers.

[fflint]

The LA Times definitely took a turn for the worst under Tribune ownership. It's by no means too late to turn the paper around and get it back to where it was before, and hopefully Geffen is the man for the job.

[Chase Unperson]

It must have really been a great paper. I have only been reading it for a little over 2 years, and I quite like it. Plus they have the best on-line version of their paper in terms of presentation.

[Buckeye Native 001]

It's true the LAT's recent history is highly decorated. But I'd agree with Buckeye Native, *as of now* it's toilet paper. In the few years it's owned it, Tribune has really laid ruin to the Times. The LAT has lost many of it's most celebrated writers.

The L.A. Times had a marvellous past under the Chandlers. Nowadays, when articles found in the Orange County Register begin to look more appealing than the Times' coverage, you know you've got problem. ;)

[citywatch]

Tribune Called on to Sell L.A. Times

Report says Los Angeles power elite turning up pressure, making offers, to try to pry Times away from Tribune Co.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) Sept 18 2006 -- Tribune Co. is under increasing pressure to sell its largest paper, the Los Angeles Times, according to published reports, just as the company is close to working out a truce with the Chandler family, the former owner of the paper and one of the company's largest shareholder. The Wall Street Journal reports that several prominent Los Angeles billionaires are interested in buying the L.A. Times, the nation's No. 4 paper in terms of circulation.

Business leaders in Los Angeles are also joining together to urge Tribune Co. (Charts) not to make further staff and cost cuts at the paper, saying that it should sell the paper if it is not satisfied with results. The paper's editor and publisher were quoted in an L.A. Times story last week as saying they disagreed with Tribune Co. calls for further cuts.

The Tribune Co. bought the LA Times as part of its purchase of the Times Mirror Co. in 2000. The purchase made the Chandler family the company's No. 2 shareholder in Tribune Co., and made the newspaper publisher party to two complicated partnerships with the Chandlers, which could not be unwound until this month without negative tax consequences. The Chicago Tribune, which is also owned by the Tribune Co. and the Journal, both reported Friday that the Chandlers and the Tribune Co. were close to a deal to unwind those partnerships, which could open the way to corporate moves such as spinning off television stations or selling newspapers.

The Tribune board meets Thursday, and the Journal reported Monday that Tribune Co. CEO Dennis FitzSimons is expected to deliver on a directive from the board to present a plan for the future of the media company. Scott Smith, president of the company's newspaper unit, Tribune Publishing, seemed to dismiss the idea of a sale of the L.A. Times in an interview with the Journal. He told the paper he sees the Times and its staff as a central source of content for other Tribune Co. newspapers.

But the Journal reports that Eli Broad, philanthropist and founder of insurer SunAmerica, and supermarket magnate Ronald Burkle, recently sat down with representatives of the Chandler family and their investment bankers to discuss how they might structure a deal to purchase the Times from Tribune. However the paper reports people close to the Chandlers said these talks didn't go far. In addition, entertainment industry mogul David Geffen made his own separate, informal, all-cash offer to buy the Times, according to people familiar with the situation.

In response to all three overtures, Mr. FitzSimons wrote a letter saying the board had decided unanimously to not discuss the transaction "at this time," according to a person who saw one copy.

Newspapers are still profitable; the Journal reports that the L.A. Times has an operating profit of 20 percent. But they are under pressure from declining readership and advertising revenue as they face competition from new media sources, such as the Internet.

Tribune stock is down nearly 40 percent since the end of 2003. The company took on debt to finance a $2 billion share buyback earlier this year to try to help share price, a move that was opposed by the Chandler family trust. The Tribune Co. is not alone in seeing sharp share price decline over the last 12 months; No. 1 newspaper publisher Gannett Co .has (Charts) seen its stock fall even more sharply, dropping more than 20 percent in the last year, while the New York Times (Charts) has lost nearly 30 percent in that period. Shares of Journal publisher Dow Jones Co. (Charts) and the Washington Post (Charts) are also sharply lower.

Knight-Ridder, one of the nation's largest newspaper companies, was acquired by The McClatchy Company (Charts) earlier this year under pressure from shareholders to sell its assets to make up for share price declines there. Since that purchase, McClatchy has sold off several former Knight-Ridder papers, some to local ownership groups.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ Argh, seems like Tribune is not going to give up their most precious asset. Hopefully Geffen will step up to the plate. Eli Broad/Burkle seem the most serious about this however. But I really like Geffen's idea of bringing the paper back to the national stage.

[DJM19]

We need a full joint effort.

[citywatch]

^ Argh, seems like Tribune is not going to give up their most precious asset. Those ppl in Chitown don't know how to run & manage a first rate paper. It's time for them to get their schlocko hands off the LA Times.

[Chase Unperson]

[/b]Those ppl in Chitown don't know how to run & manage a first rate paper. It's time for them to get their schlocko hands off the LA Times.


The Tribune's goal is to increase profit for their shareholders. If making the LA times a second or third rate paper increases profit, then all else is secondary.

It is the same in entertainment (which has a lot of overlap with newspaper, BTW), healthcare, retail, technology, etc...

We all think that making the Times a "world class" paper should be the goal. That isn't realistic in this day and age. At least not when fortune 500 companies are running the show. It is like expecting Hollywood to release world class films or expecting all radio stations to be like KCRW in spirit.

A local owner who isn't foremost interested in profit might make a difference, but local people also gave us the Grove, so you never know.

[ocman]

I think it would be much easier and better for the LA Times if someone just did a takeover of the Tribune Company, rather than selling the Times. Tribune is obviously showing a lot of weakness and desperation. There has got to be a few companies in Manhattan that are eyeing Tribune.

The problem with LA Times is not that it isn't national, it's that it isn't local. It doesn't speak to Los Angeles anymore so why read it? You get better national coverage in the NY Times?

[RAlossi]

I once carded Mr. Geffen at the retail store in WeHo where I used to work (LASC). I had no idea who he was, and carding him almost got me fired! haha.

My manager: "Will you please tell me... why you carded Mr. Geffen?"

Me: "Who's that?"

Manager: "Ugh."

I still don't think it was such a big deal =)

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ Wow! I can't believe u worked at LASC! I bought a few cute shirts from there!

[ocman]

What is LASC?

[KarLarRec1]

I was just at LASC a few days ago. It's gotten waaaay overpriced! I don't remember the prices being so high when they were located across from the Virgin Megastore.

(LASC = Los Angeles Sporting Club, a trendy and upscale mens apparel retailer located on Santa Monica Blvd. in West Hollywood, previously in the same complex as the Virgin Megastore on Sunset Blvd.)

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ They should open another branch in Hollywood and eventually Downtown LA :)

[ocman]

I was just at LASC a few days ago. It's gotten waaaay overpriced! I don't remember the prices being so high when they were located across from the Virgin Megastore.

(LASC = Los Angeles Sporting Club, a trendy and upscale mens apparel retailer located on Santa Monica Blvd. in West Hollywood, previously in the same complex as the Virgin Megastore on Sunset Blvd.)


That's retarded. Does Geffen own the LASC? Who the fuck cares if you piss him off for carding him? Are you never gonna sell clothes in this town again?

[edluva]

Tribune Shares Rise on Word of Possible Breakup
By Thomas S. Mulligan, James Rainey and Michael A. Hiltzik, Times Staff Writers
3:39 PM PDT, September 22, 2006

Shares of Tribune Co. jumped more than 6% today after the company's board said it would explore a possible breakup, sale and other options for the company that owns the Los Angeles Times, KTLA-TV Channel 5 and other media properties nationwide.

Tribune, which also owns the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Cubs, said late Thursday that a special panel of independent directors would study "alternatives for creating additional value for shareholders."

Companies often use such language when they put themselves on the path toward a sale or a breakup. Chicago-based Tribune said it expected to complete the process by the end of this year.

Wall Street greeted the news by pushing up the value of Tribune's stock more than 10% during the past two days. Today, Tribune stock rose $1.94, or more than 6%, to close at $33.99 on the New York Stock Exchange.

While the company's stock has risen sharply, Tribune's debt was downgraded today to speculative or "junk" bond status by the bond ratings agency Standard & Poors.

Tribune bought Times Mirror Co., then the parent of The Times, in 2000 for about $8 billion, expecting that ownership of television stations and newspapers in the same cities would give the company an edge with advertisers and in pursuing the emerging Internet arena.

But those benefits did not materialize.

In a five-hour meeting on the 24th floor of Tribune Tower, a massive Gothic landmark in the heart of downtown Chicago, the board unanimously approved a restructuring of two partnerships at the center of a boardroom rift that broke out this summer involving the Chandler family, which controlled Times Mirror and is now Tribune's largest shareholder bloc.

The family had been pushing to restructure the partnerships, which had been an obstacle to a sale or other transaction that might have lifted the company's battered stock price.

The three Chandler representatives on the 11-member board abstained from voting. Under Thursday's deal, the Chandler family will receive stock in Tribune that will raise its stake. Restructuring the partnerships will also cut the family's potential tax burden from the sale of any assets.

Tribune Chairman and Chief Executive Dennis J. FitzSimons said in an interview Thursday night that the deal with the Chandlers could make it easier to sell the company or take it private, but he emphasized that the company had not committed to any alternative.

"It eliminates the impediments to all kinds of things," said FitzSimons, who previously has opposed pursuing such radical strategies as a sale of the company or its largest property, The Times.

The special committee is made up of seven independent board members, including Pasadena resident Enrique Hernandez Jr., who is chairman and CEO of Inter-Con Security Systems Inc. Neither FitzSimons nor the three representatives of the Chandler family are part of the committee.

Tribune shares rose $1.36 on Thursday to close at $32.05, lifting the company's market value to $7.9 billion, before the news was announced after the stock market closed. Analysts have estimated that Tribune's assets could be worth $40 to $45 a share.

Like other old-line media companies, Tribune has seen advertising revenue for its newspapers and TV stations shrink with the emergence of the Internet as a powerful draw for consumers. The Times and other major newspapers have suffered circulation declines with shifting demographics and competition from digital media.

A resulting slump in Tribune's stock -- it has lost almost half its value in the six years since the Times Mirror acquisition -- has led Wall Street to clamor for action. It was similar pressure from stockholders that spurred the $4.5-billion sale this year of Knight Ridder Inc., then the nation's second-largest newspaper chain, to Sacramento-based McClatchy Co.

Despite industry woes, The Times -- the nation's fourth-largest newspaper by circulation -- boasts a profit margin of 20% and is expected to produce pretax profit of a quarter-billion dollars this year.

The Times accounted for nearly 20% of Tribune's 2005 revenue of $5.6 billion and roughly the same percentage of the company's operating profit of $1.15 billion, according to executives at the paper who did not want to be named because those figures are not public.

Tribune also owns the Chicago Cubs and a host of websites including interests in CareerBuilder.com and Cars.com.

Tribune's struggles provide the latest evidence that the big media mergers of the late 1990s and the early part of this decade may have been based on a flawed principle: that "synergies" among print, broadcast and Internet properties would supercharge their aggregate value.

America Online Inc.'s $99-billion acquisition of Time Warner Inc. was widely seen as the biggest bust, but Viacom Inc. also backpedaled recently, spinning off CBS Corp. from its movie, cable-TV and digital properties.

The dissatisfaction with Tribune crystallized in June, when the Chandlers publicly lambasted its management and demanded that it spin off the company's 25 TV stations, sell some of its 11 newspapers or auction off the entire company.

Once the Chandlers went public, potential buyers for The Times quickly emerged from the city's billionaire class, including music mogul David Geffen, philanthropist Eli Broad and supermarket magnate Ronald Burkle.

Private investment companies also began considering how Tribune might be taken private in a leveraged buyout, a transaction in which the bulk of the purchase price is financed with bank borrowings. Such buyers generally don't invest for the long term. Rather, they usually cut costs and resell the asset in five to seven years.

Major institutional investors, such as Chicago-based Ariel Capital Management, which owns 6% of Tribune shares, also have been weighing in publicly but less confrontationally than the Chandlers.

"Ariel has continuously expressed confidence that the strong board and management of Tribune would take steps to realize the intrinsic value of the company," Ariel's vice chairman, Charles K. Bobrinskoy, said in an interview Thursday night. "Today's actions made clear that this confidence is being rewarded."

Outside experts were divided on whether Thursday's action would inevitably lead to something as dramatic as a breakup or a sale of The Times.

Paul Ginocchio, a publishing and advertising analyst for Deutsche Bank, said the realignment of the partnerships cleared a path for dramatic changes.

"Why wouldn't you get rid of the L.A. Times, your squeakiest wheel? Or most of the TV assets could be spun off or sold," Ginocchio said. "Then Tribune is in a position to go private, if that is what they want to do."

But independent newspaper analyst John Morton noted that the seven board members on the special committee -- the full board, minus FitzSimons and the three Chandler directors -- have supported management, which has been reluctant to sell The Times.

"I find it unlikely they would want to dispose of the Los Angeles Times, which is a major revenue and profit producer for them," Morton said. "It would seem irrational. On the other hand, there are other forces at work, namely the Chandler family."

In June, Tribune announced that three Chandler representatives on its board opposed a $2-billion stock buyback, which FitzSimons had introduced as part of a "performance improvement plan" that he said would also include $500 million in asset sales and $200 million in cost cuts.

The company has already sold three television stations and 2.8 million shares of Time Warner stock to raise much of the $500 million. But proposed staff reductions have caused a backlash at The Times, where Editor Dean Baquet said layoffs threatened to damage the paper's quality.

The disagreement between the Los Angeles paper and its Chicago parent came to a head in late August, when Baquet and Times Publisher Jeffrey M. Johnson declined to present Tribune Publishing President Scott C. Smith with a list of cost reductions he had demanded. The Times executives went public with the dispute last week as 20 Los Angeles civic leaders were voicing their own displeasure over newsroom cuts in a letter to Tribune management.

FitzSimons said that despite the friction between the Chandlers and Tribune management, Thursday's board meeting was "positive and cordial," with smiles and handshakes at the conclusion. But there was no assurance that the agreement would change Tribune's plan to cut expenses, including jobs at The Times and other holdings.

The restructuring of the Chandler-Tribune partnerships will raise the Chandlers' Tribune stake to 21% from 16%. However, the family will not enjoy the full voting power of its new shares for a year.

The two partnerships held assets valued at $3.55 billion at the end of 2005, including Tribune shares, real estate, and a wide range of equity investments, some of them in a speculative venture capital portfolio.

Under the agreement, Tribune will receive three-quarters of the Tribune shares in the partnerships, which are worth $1.27 billion at Thursday's closing price. The company will also receive preferred shares valued at about $500 million. The Chandler family trusts will receive the remaining common shares worth more than $378 million.

The partnerships will retain assets that were valued at $1.45 billion at the end of 2005.

These include Tribune properties valued on the books at $225 million but reportedly valued by a Tribune appraisal at $325 million and potentially worth even more. These properties include the former Times Mirror Square, the downtown Los Angeles headquarters of The Times, as well as newspaper plants in Baltimore and on New York's Long Island. The partnerships also hold other equities valued at year-end 2005 at $633.5 million and real estate investment trusts worth $593.3 million.

Moreover, Tribune will have an option to acquire the newspapers' real estate in January 2008 for $175 million, which may be worth as much as $225 million.

Tribune said that the restructuring would produce a one-time taxable gain of $45 million.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Tribune's Future Not Easy to Read

As The Times' owner weighs action to increase share value, analysts say its broadcast holdings or smaller papers may end up on the block.


By James Rainey and Meg James
Times Staff Writers

September 23, 2006

The revelation that the leaders of Tribune Co. might sell or break up the media company puts nationally known properties such as the Chicago Cubs and the Los Angeles Times up for grabs. But a variety of observers said Friday that Tribune is more likely to sell its television stations or smaller newspapers than its marquee holdings.

Chief Executive Dennis J. FitzSimons and his management team will explore various options for increasing the Chicago company's stock price. But a committee of seven independent directors named Thursday will have the final say on the future of the company, said a person who was familiar with the board's deliberations.

"Dennis said he believes in his strategy and that it would have positive outcomes," said the source, who requested anonymity. "But we have not seen that financial performance, and he hasn't delivered what he said. Now the committee is going to have to look at other things to do."

The special committee plans to hire an investment banking firm as an advisor to complete its review by year's end.

The prospect of change sent Tribune shares soaring $1.94 Friday, or 6.1%, to $33.99, the highest price in nearly a year. Some analysts and the largest shareholder, the California-based Chandler family, have projected that the company would be worth substantially more if some of its 12 newspapers or 25 television stations were sold piecemeal or spun off to shareholders — perhaps lifting the shares into the $40 range.

In July, one Wall Street firm estimated the company's breakup value at about $10 billion — more than its $8.4-billion stock market value.

But many other observers pointed to myriad problems confronting the company, including a debt load that now stands at $4.6 billion. Tribune's faltering bond ratings fell again Friday, when two credit-rating firms, Standard & Poor's and Fitch Ratings, downgraded the company's debt to junk status.

More fundamentally, television stations and newspapers are seeing their audiences and advertising revenues siphoned off by new media, especially the Internet. Tribune and other newspaper companies have struggled with sagging sales in the last two years.

Citigroup analyst William Bird, in a report published Friday, speculated that there was only a slight chance Tribune would be sold to another media company or taken private by an investor group. He said the company's high debt level, lack of growth and high concentration of stations in the unproven CW network "are factors not likely to draw high private-equity interest."

Much more likely, in Bird's view, is a spinoff of the broadcast division. He said the value of the two pieces would trade at a total of $34. That's barely above Tribune's closing share price Friday, although a split-up probably would produce greater value in the long run, he said.

Despite skepticism from the financial markets and many Tribune employees, FitzSimons has given no indication that he intends to drop the "synergy" strategy launched when the company bought Times Mirror Co., the former parent of The Times, which was controlled by the Chandler family.

Since the 2000 acquisition, Tribune has banked on the largely unfulfilled promise that cross-ownership of newspapers and television outlets — particularly in Los Angeles, Chicago and New York — would drive up ad sales.

Even after this week's action seemed to put the entire company in play, FitzSimons told the Wall Street Journal: "The L.A. Times is part of Tribune and not for sale."

Veteran newspaper analyst John Morton said the company showed no signs of changing its stand. "To sell one of their major newspapers would negate their whole operating philosophy of the last six years."

The appeal of selling the company's biggest papers, including the Los Angeles Times, could also be limited by the substantial tax bill the company would face, according to one newspaper executive. And Tribune probably would not readily relinquish the paper that produces one-fifth of its revenue and profit.

Interest in buying The Times from three wealthy Angelenos may not overcome those barriers.

A more probable scenario would be the sale of three smaller papers in Connecticut — the Hartford Courant, the Stamford Advocate and Greenwich Time — and the Allentown (Pa.) Morning Call, Morton said.

The most likely buyers of such properties in recent years have been companies already operating in the region, allowing for combined editorial, advertising and even printing operations.

That could mean the Newhouse family's Advance Publications, owner of a newspaper in Easton, Pa., might take an interest in the Morning Call. A particularly low-cost operator, the Journal-Register Co., already owns several papers in Connecticut and could bid on those in that state, Morton added.

The market for television stations faces its own challenges. Besides similar tax issues, there is a flat advertising market that is heading into a nonelection year, lacking lucrative political advertising.

Further uncertainty comes because the Federal Communications Commission has not resolved the question of how many television stations a media company can own or whether a company can operate a newspaper and TV station in the same geographic market. That decision is not expected until the spring, further limiting the field of buyers, a media analyst said.

But the television group may have more value as a unit because it is in the position to buy syndicated shows, a prime driver of audience numbers and ad revenue.

That would argue for keeping the Tribune stations together, perhaps in a tax-free spinoff or a private purchase, said a television executive who asked not to be named.

Thursday's pivotal board meeting did nothing to resolve the fate of several key players in the Tribune drama.

FitzSimons remains in control of the company and is involved in the study of future alternatives. He is said to be well-liked by the Tribune board, which is dominated by prominent Chicago business executives who have stood by him even as the company stumbled financially and the dissatisfied Chandler family rebelled.

One person close to the company said the CEO's fate had become increasingly uncertain as a loyal board came to believe it was obliged to heed the Chandlers' complaints.

But others painted a scenario in which FitzSimons remained in charge of a scaled-down Tribune that maintained its core Chicago assets — the Chicago Tribune, WGN-TV and the Cubs baseball team — and most of its newspapers.

Two other top executives with the company — Los Angeles Times Publisher Jeffrey M. Johnson and Editor Dean Baquet — also remained on uncertain footing. Both aroused the ire of their Tribune bosses last month, when they balked at demands to cut the size of the paper's editorial operation.

A business associate of FitzSimons' said he believed that the Tribune chief would not let the apparent act of defiance go unpunished. But another person in the company's upper ranks said The Times duo could be viewed as fulfilling their duty for insisting on blocking reductions that they felt would damage the quality of the paper.

Despite predictions to the contrary, the Tribune board scarcely focused on the controversy at Thursday's meeting. In a five-hour session, the directors spent only a few minutes discussing The Times' editor and publisher.

"The board is more concerned with all the newspaper and TV stations," the insider said. "They are involved in the macro level, looking at the future of the company."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
james.rainey@latimes.com

meg.james@latimes.com

*

Staff writer Thomas S. Mulligan contributed to this report.

*

(INFOBOX BELOW)

Tribune Co.

Founded: 1847

Headquarters: Chicago

Chief executive: Dennis J. FitzSimons

Employees: 22,400

Publishing holdings: Twelve daily newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Newsday, Baltimore Sun, Orlando Sentinel and Hoy (Spanish-language)

Television holdings: Twenty-five stations, including KTLA (Los Angeles), WGN (Chicago) and WPIX (New York)

Other properties: Chicago Cubs baseball team, WGN radio

Investments: CareerBuilder (online recruitment services), 42.5% share; TV Food Network, 31%; ShopLocal (online advertising), 43%; Legacy.com (online obituaries), 40%

Market capitalization: $8.4 billion

2005 revenue: $5.6 billion

Source: Tribune

*

Sum of the parts

--

Morgan Stanley estimated in July that the net value of Tribune's parts amounted to $10 billion.

---

Est. market value (in billions)

-

Newspapers: $9.5

TV, radio, entertainment: $4.3

Investments, cash, other: $1.7

Chicago Cubs: $0.4

Debt, preferred stock: -$5.2

Corporate expenses: $-0.7

-

Net total: $10

Current stock market value: $8.4

--

Sources: Morgan Stanley, Bloomberg News


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[RAlossi]

(LASC = Los Angeles Sporting Club, a trendy and upscale mens apparel retailer located on Santa Monica Blvd. in West Hollywood, previously in the same complex as the Virgin Megastore on Sunset Blvd.)

They actually had two branches, and the Strip location closed down due to poor sales. That Virgin Megastore complex doesn't do very well for businesses, actually. I think they charge too much for parking or something.

The WeHo location has been in business for years at the same place, though.

[Alta California]

I don't understand why is everyone so enthused about having multi-billionaires buy up the largest paper in the city? It wouldn't change a thing. LA Times has always been less than interested in the city than its pretentions to be a world-class paper. That's why more often than not, it's front page is an alienating morning read as its stories are detached from the city it takes its name from. The only article I read often is the "Neighborly Advice" features on Sunday where a lucky (often posh and white) LA neighborhood gets profiled. For breaking local news I always look to the NY Times anyway.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^ You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. Your choice of words are based purely on ignorance, like "pretentions" to be a great paper? You're either a great paper or you're not. And judging by the amount of Pulitzer Prize winners LA Times has had, it sure as hell isn't a shoddy paper. Please stop pontificating.

Futhermore, the new CEO of LA Times has specifically guided the paper to cover more local news that matter to Angelenos. You've got to be kidding me when you say that the LA Times DOESN'T cover LA news because I post articles on this website ALL TIME and news flash!, it's from the LA Times usually and it's about LA usually.

I love how people on here think they're so smart and yet the most incredibly inept things are typed.

A bunch of multi-billionaires, such as Broad or Geffen, have grander visions than what Tribune has failed to do for the LA Times. And if you don't understand why EVERYONE else is so enthused, perhaps you're just a little slower than most.

[Alta California]

^ You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about. Your choice of words are based purely on ignorance, like "pretentions" to be a great paper? You're either a great paper or you're not. And judging by the amount of Pulitzer Prize winners LA Times has had, it sure as hell isn't a shoddy paper. Please stop pontificating.

Futhermore, the new CEO of LA Times has specifically guided the paper to cover more local news that matter to Angelenos. You've got to be kidding me when you say that the LA Times DOESN'T cover LA news because I post articles on this website ALL TIME and news flash!, it's from the LA Times usually and it's about LA usually.

I love how people on here think they're so smart and yet the most incredibly inept things are typed.

A bunch of multi-billionaires, such as Broad or Geffen, have grander visions than what Tribune has failed to do for the LA Times. And if you don't understand why EVERYONE else is so enthused, perhaps you're just a little slower than most.

So let me get this straight. You laud the LA Times for winning Pulitzer Prizes, 13 OF WHICH WERE WON DURING TRIBUNE OWNERSHIP including the record-setting five in one year (2004). Yet for some reason (much wishful thinking in your part) you believe that a coterie of multi-billionaires, none of whom by the way, have ever owned a paper can do a better job than the Tribune? Sugar daddy syndrome? I have no dog in this fight and I'm mystified that anyone does; this is more a response to your overreaction. Washington Post has won the exact same number since 2000 but does it with an editorial staff of 800 compared to 940 to the LA Times.

You:
I love how people on here think they're so smart and yet the most incredibly inept things are typed.

:haha:

[bjornson]

I thought the number was 15 (since 2000). The Times has 37 Pulitzers (second most).

[LosAngelesBeauty]

^^ Yes, I have faith that LOCALS (not some company in Chicago) will have more pride in our hometown and do our paper justice. My dream (as unrealistic as it is) is to have it become a nationally respected paper.


And I wouldn't expect someone with a name like "Alta Calif" to care enough for "Baja Calif" well being.

[Wright Concept]

My only concern is that LA Times doesn't turn out like the New York Post, creating far left or right wing propoganda because a rich benefactor with Political connections can skew the truth anyway they feel like so they can get their puppets elected.

An objective paper is needed for LA, that is what turned the LA Times to world class status, that doesn't skew a report into an editorial.

[fflint]

An article that touches on the issue in general and the LA Times specifically:

Do Newspapers Have a Future?
Quarreling about staff cuts, the old medium is missing the bigger questions

By MICHAEL KINSLEY
Time.com
Monday, Sep. 25, 2006

It seems hopeless. How can the newspaper industry survive the Internet? On the one hand, newspapers are expected to supply their content free on the Web. On the other hand, their most profitable advertising--classifieds--is being lost to sites like Craigslist. And display advertising is close behind. Meanwhile, there is the blog terror: people are getting their understanding of the world from random lunatics riffing in their underwear, rather than professional journalists with standards and passports.

Ten years ago, it was a challenge for websites to get people to spend time for pleasure in front of a computer screen. "Your problem will be solved actuarially," a computer-sciences professor assured a group of Web pioneers, and sure enough, it was. Now the problem is to get people under 50 or so to pick up a newspaper. Damp or encased in plastic bags, or both, and planted in the bushes outside where it's cold, full of news that is cold too because it has been sitting around for hours, the home-delivered newspaper is an archaic object. Who needs it? You can sit down at your laptop and enjoy that same newspaper or any other newspaper in the world. Or you can skip the newspapers and go to some site that makes the news more entertaining or politically simpatico. And where do these wannabes get most of their information? From newspapers, of course. But that is mere irony. It doesn't pay the cost of a Baghdad bureau.

Newspaper angst is now focused on the Los Angeles Times, where I was editorial and opinion editor in 2004 and '05. Long the industry's leading example of needless excellence, the Times has had bureaus around the world, a huge Washington staff and so on. Yet it had a near monopoly in its own town and made little attempt to compete elsewhere. So what was the point?

The Tribune Co. of Chicago, which bought the L.A. Times six years ago, has been asking that question and answering it with demands for cuts in budget and staff. One might ask what the point of the Tribune approach is as well. The Tribune paid a premium for a premium paper and seems intent on dragging it down into mediocrity. That may improve margins in the short run, but it does nothing to address the fundamental crisis of newspapers. Two weeks ago the Times's editor and publisher publicly refused to chop any further, which doesn't address the crisis either.

Some believe that the answer is to restore local ownership. Newspapers were born free, and yet everywhere they are in chains, like Gannett. Fueled by noblesse oblige and municipal pride, a wealthy local won't need to squeeze the last dollar out of the business. Just look at the Sulzbergers of the New York Times and the Grahams of the Washington Post. Ah, but there is a difference between folks who get rich owning a newspaper and folks who get rich and then buy a newspaper. As a rule, rich folks don't buy expensive toys for other people to play with.

So are we doomed to get our news from some acned 12-year-old in his parents' basement recycling rumors from the Internet echo chamber? Not necessarily. The fact that people won't pay for news on the Internet isn't as devastating for the old medium as it seems. People don't pay for their news in traditional newspapers: they pay for the paper, which typically costs the company more than it charges for the finished product. So in theory, giving away the news without the paper looks like a good deal for newspapers, if they can keep the advertising.

Once you've rented an apartment online, you know that traditional newspaper classifieds, with their tiny type, have no future. But only slow-footedness has kept newspapers from dominating online classifieds. Technology can be bought, but the brand value of a local newspaper cannot (unless you buy the paper). Maybe it's too late, but if newspapers have missed this boat, it's their own fault.

Newspapers are not missing the blog boat. They are running for it like the last train out of Paris. They hold their breath and look the other way as their most precious rules and standards get trampled in the rush, and figure they'll worry about that later.

And later? The "me to you" model of news gathering--a professional reporter, attuned to the fine distinctions between "off the record" and "deep background," prizing factual accuracy in the narrowest sense--may well give way to some kind of "us to us" communitarian arrangement of the sort that thrives on the Internet. But there is room between the New York Times and myleftarmpit.com for new forms that liberate journalism from its encrusted conceits while preserving its standards, like accuracy.

I'm not sure what that new form will look like. But it might resemble the better British papers today (such as the one I work for, the Guardian). The Brits have never bought into the American separation of reporting and opinion. They assume that an intelligent person, paid to learn about some subject, will naturally develop views about it. And they consider it more truthful to express those views than to suppress them in the name of objectivity.

Newspapers on paper are on the way out. Whether newspaper companies are on the way out too depends. Some of them are going to find the answers. And some are going to fritter away the years quarreling about staff cuts.

[bobcat]

I was cruising some other internet forums and came across this deal. It's for a 1 year weekend subscription (Fri, Sat, Sun) to the LA Times for $39 plus you receive a $20 Home Depot gift card. Call 1-800-658-7476 and mention the offer. Offer expires 10/15/06. Great deal for anyone wanting to help boost the Times circulation numbers.

[ReDSPork02]

Los Angeles Newspaper Building Is a Film Star
Paramount
http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/09/30/arts/30loca_CA0.600.jpg Jamie Foxx and Beyonce in a scene from "Dreamgirls."


By ALLISON HOPE WEINER
Published: September 30, 2006

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 29 — David Geffen may or may not succeed in buying The Los Angeles Times. But his people have already tried the executive suite on for size.





Damian Dovarganes/Associated Press
http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/09/30/arts/30loca_CA1.190.jpg The Los Angeles Times building is seen in downtown Los Angeles Monday morning, March 13, 2000.


AP Photo/Paramount Pictures, David James
http://graphics10.nytimes.com/images/2006/09/30/arts/30loca_CA2.190.jpg Actor Jaime Foxx, left, in an adaptation of the Broadway musical "Dreamgirls," about a singing trio's rise to stardom. Actors at right are unidentified. The film is due in theaters in November 2006.

David Geffen, co-founder of DreamWorks, will produce films for Paramount.
Mr. Geffen’s “Dreamgirls” is one of several film and television productions recently shot in the lush corporate offices atop the paper’s downtown quarters here. Those upstairs offices once housed executives of the Times Mirror Company, but have largely served as conference rooms for the Times staff since the Chicago-based Tribune Company bought Times Mirror in 2000.

Even before June, when the Chandler family, the second-largest investor in Tribune, called for a breakup of the company, Mr. Geffen, the music and film mogul, had expressed interest in buying The Los Angeles Times. While Tribune assesses whether to sell The Times and other properties in a possible restructuring, Mr. Geffen has remained a potential buyer, as have two other wealthy individuals, Eli Broad, the financier and philanthropist, and Ronald Burkle, the supermarket tycoon.

Meanwhile, the newspaper has been quietly making money for the last year by renting out the sixth-floor executive suite, as well as the facade for exterior shoots.

“I’m getting 10 calls a day to film here,” said Cletus Page, manager of administrative services for the building. “We’re having a very good year.”

Built in 1973 as an add-on to the 1935 building, the former Times Mirror offices have a decidedly modern look, with wood paneling, unusually spacious executive offices and large glass windows with expansive city views. Along with “Dreamgirls,” the building has been a location for Brian De Palma’s recent film, “The Black Dahlia,” as well as the television shows “Nip/Tuck,” “Studio 60” and “Bones.”

Filming fees at the downtown location average around $8,000 a day, a price that can vary with a production company’s specific needs. Unlike other buildings that showcase their availability on Web sites and in directories, the Times building has proved so popular that it does not advertise, Mr. Cletus said.

Mr. Geffen’s crew — he is one of a number of producers on “Dreamgirls,” which is set for release on Dec. 21 by DreamWorks and Paramount — had almost a month to set up the executive suite, including preproduction and other preparation. The movie, directed by Bill Condon, actually filmed at the location for a little less than a week. Scenes were shot in the executive offices, the Norman Chandler Atrium and an apartment formerly reserved for the Chandler family.

“Dreamgirls” follows the careers of a fictional all-girl 1960’s singing trio, the Dreamettes, from their rise to fame to the group’s breakup when Deena Jones, played by Beyoncé, leaves to pursue her own career. The executive suite was used as the location for Rainbow Records, the office of the fictional group’s music manager, Curtis Taylor Jr., played by Jamie Foxx.

“We shot Jamie Foxx, the music manager in the movie, in the office, as well as Beyoncé,” said Laurence Mark, one of the film’s producers. “Jamie and Beyoncé have a major scene in there when she first begins to sing the song ‘When I First Saw You.’ ”

Eric Hedayat, the movie’s location manager, said the building was selected because, he said, its “iconic architecture” matched the film’s setting in the early 1970’s.

“The garden atrium was really reflective of that era, as were the floor-to-ceiling glass windows,” he said. “You don’t see that very often anymore in that kind of an executive suite. We really only had to bring in modern furniture, change the paintings and make sure that the shots of the city didn’t include any post-70’s buildings.”

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Tribune Tightens Grip on L.A. Times

By Thomas S. Mulligan and James Rainey
Times Staff Writers

October 7, 2006

The path toward restoring local ownership of the Los Angeles Times has become more difficult in recent days as the newspaper's Chicago-based parent company has hardened its stance against selling its most valuable asset individually.

Tribune Co.'s posture could mean that potential buyers of the newspaper would have to make a bid on the entire company, or perhaps its publishing division, to obtain The Times.

Scott C. Smith, Tribune's president of publishing, said in an interview in Los Angeles this week that he wanted to lay to rest the talk of selling The Times. Apart from a previously announced plan to sell $500 million worth of smaller newspaper or broadcast properties, he said, "individual business units are not for sale at this time."

That also would apply to Tribune's other assets that have attracted would-be suitors such as Newsday in New York and the Baltimore Sun.

Some on Wall Street, however, believe that a piecemeal approach may be the best way to maximize the company's value because certain buyers might be willing to pay a premium for such assets as The Times and the Chicago Cubs baseball team.

"We believe that there are strategic buyers that would be willing to pay healthy multiples for the assets," analyst Debra Schwartz of Credit Suisse wrote in a report.

Three wealthy Los Angeles businessmen are on record as having an interest in buying The Times: music mogul David Geffen, philanthropist Eli Broad and supermarket investor Ron Burkle. Any one of them could line up his own group to buy the entire company.

In any event, Tribune management does not have the last word. Any plan requires approval by the seven-member special committee of Tribune directors created Sept. 21.

Legal experts said the panel also could decide to take an active role in exploring options if it believed that management was leaving some stones unturned.

"They've got seven out of 11 votes, so in theory they can do what they want," said Keith P. Bishop, an Irvine-based partner at law firm Buchalter Nemer and a former California Department of Corporations commissioner.

"These processes frequently start with people having one or two fixed agendas," said a major Tribune shareholder who declined to speak for attribution. "But the long lore about what a special committee is about is responsible people doing responsible things."

Not named to the committee were Tribune Chairman and Chief Executive Dennis J. FitzSimons and the three directors representing California's Chandler family. The family, Tribune's largest shareholder group, publicly attacked management's strategy in June, disappointed with a stock price that has dropped 40% since 2004.

The committee announced last week that it had hired law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom as its independent legal advisor. People in the investment-banking field expected Morgan Stanley to be chosen as a financial advisor.

Tribune is being advised by Citigroup Inc. and Merrill Lynch.

When Tribune announced the panel's creation two weeks ago, FitzSimons said all value-creating options were on the table. Last week, he said management was "determining the best strategic alternatives for the company and its publishing and broadcast groups as a whole, before evaluating strategic alternatives for individual business units."

Smith put a finer point on that view this week by saying that the individual units were "not for sale at this time."

Smith was in Los Angeles on Thursday to force out Times Publisher Jeffrey M. Johnson and appoint Chicago Tribune Publisher David D. Hiller as his successor. Johnson had opposed management's call for further newsroom cuts. Besides The Times and the Cubs, Tribune owns the Chicago Tribune, KTLA-TV and WGN-TV in Chicago, plus nine smaller newspapers and 23 other TV stations around the country.

One newspaper executive who has watched the unfolding events at Tribune said a sale of the whole company would be "a lot cleaner" than a piecemeal approach.

There is also the time factor: Tribune has set an ambitious deadline of year-end to present a strategic plan for the committee's approval. The newspaper executive, who spoke on condition of anonymity, predicted that two or three consortiums of private-equity firms might emerge as bidders for Tribune. When Knight Ridder Inc., then the nation's second-largest newspaper chain, put itself up for sale this year, it attracted only one bid, from McClatchy Co., which bought the company for about $4.5 billion.

A number of private-equity firms kicked the tires, but none submitted a bid for Knight Ridder. In a slowing economy and an environment in which Wall Street considers newspaper and broadcast advertising to be in irreversible decline, investment firms worry that they may be unable to resell such properties in their usual three- to five-year timeframe.

Tribune may be more attractive than Knight Ridder because of "the diversity of their assets," the newspaper executive said. "There is more they can do in terms of selling things off."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
thomas.mulligan@latimes.com

james.rainey@latimes.com

[DJM19]

Yeah, Im losing a lot of hope in the whole idea of the Times being for sale. Seems the tribune wants to hold on tight

[SunMonTueWedThuFriSa]

I agree with Kinsley about the LA Times becoming a mouthpiece for the west coast as well as more prominent nationally. I don't like the idea of a national tribune or glamourizing the LA Times though.

Forget the L.A. Times; How About a National Tribune?

Former opinion editor feels ex-Publisher Jeff Johnson's pain, gives his recipe for 21st century success.
By Michael Kinsley, Michael Kinsley is American Editor of the Guardian (London) and former editorial page editor of The Times.
October 8, 2006


OCCASIONALLY, during the year and change that I ran the opinion pages of this newspaper (ending a little over a year ago), I would pick a freeway and drive until I saw a Target or a Wal-Mart. Then I would stop, buy a T-shirt or something and head home. Having foolishly chosen to live downtown before Eli Broad was quite ready for me, this was as good a way as any to learn the lay of the land.

One time, I chose the 101, but quickly got tired and discouraged. So I checked into a motel in what turned out to be Thousand Oaks. (Yes, there is a Target on the 101 just past Thousand Oaks. I know that now.) In the morning, I sought out a Starbucks for coffee and the newspaper. It had the New York Times, like every Starbucks, and it had the Ventura Who-Cares-What-It's-Called. But no Los Angeles Times. Thousand Oaks is right across the border in Ventura County, yet apparently the L.A. Times couldn't even manage to get its paper into the local Starbucks.

ADVERTISEMENT
The Los Angeles Times is a collection of mostly superb journalists who on many days put out the best newspaper in America. But what is the point of publishing a national-quality newspaper if it can't be obtained in Thousand Oaks, let alone Washington or New York? Tribune Co. is right that you don't need 1,200 journalists, or even 900, to put out a paper for Los Angeles County. Nor do you need a good website. (And the Times' — through no fault of the people currently running it, who do their talented best with little encouragement from management — is the worst of any major paper.) But why did Tribune pay $8 billion for the Times-Mirror papers in 2000 if its ambitions were so modest?

This won't be a problem for long. National-quality journalists who work for the L.A. Times, attracted by good salaries and great editors (first, John Carroll and now Dean Baquet), endure the frustration of not being read by the people they write about. If money keeps getting tighter and the paper's ambitions keep getting narrower, they will leave if they can, or won't come to work in L.A. in the first place. Then The Times will be an adequate provincial paper like the Chicago Tribune, and the tension of being prettier than the boss' daughter will be resolved.

My own departure from the L.A. Times does not in any way illustrate this dilemma. An apparatchik anointed by Chicago to be publisher, named Jeffrey Johnson, accepted my invitation to have a discussion about my role and then discussed his view that my services were no longer desired. Why? I still don't know, exactly. But there are plausible theories, none having to do with money. Jeff let me go so artfully that I was back in my own office before I realized that I'd been canned. Later, he banned my column from the paper too. But since then, Jeff apparently went native (to use the phrase from Friday's Page 1 story), sided with the editor in opposing the latest round of cuts, and now he's been fired too. It's like the French Revolution: You guillotine me, then someone else guillotines you. Sorry, Jeff.

L.A. Times journalists are not entirely blameless for the chaos and carnage. Journalists know how to stage a great hissy fit. And I'm not sure a fit was really called for in the initial staff reductions. On the editorial page (I can reveal, from the safety of hindsight) we initially had 15 people producing 21 editorials a week! So now cries that Tribune Co. has moved from cutting fat to cutting bone ring a bit hollow.

The other issue that ignited flames of self-righteousness in my colleagues was any attempt to integrate The Times into the Tribune chain, or to achieve economies of scale by sharing costs. This sensitivity seems especially shortsighted — first, because logic was completely on Tribune's side. (Why should one company be paying four or five reporters to cover the same one-person beat?) And second, because in any merger or pseudo-merger of Tribune papers, the Los Angeles Times would clearly come out on top.

In fact, there may be no better way to preserve The Times' role as a major newspaper (if that is of any interest to its owners). These days, on the one hand, thanks to the Internet, any newspaper can be a national newspaper. On the other hand, near universal availability of the New York Times print edition makes the traditional role of a regional paper like the Los Angeles Times superfluous.

But now imagine the Tribune chain as a single newspaper with separate editions in each of its cities. Call it the National Tribune. Or the papers could keep their separate identities, but carry a "Tribune" insert or wraparound with national and international news. This paper would start out with towering dominance in two of the nation's top three markets (Los Angeles and Chicago) and a solid position, via Newsday, in the largest (New York). It would even have a toehold in Washington (thanks to the Baltimore Sun). All this, and Orlando too.

Like the British papers, this new national paper could go after a demographic slice of the market instead of a geographical one. It could aim for the currently unoccupied sweet spot between USA Today and the New York Times, or it could take on the New York Times directly.

I assumed that Tribune Co. must have had something like this in mind when it paid a premium for the Times-Mirror papers. But apparently it had something else in mind, or nothing at all.

And then there is the website. Any newspaper that wants to survive needs a good one, but the Los Angeles Times needs a good one more than any paper in the country. Why? Two reasons. First, because it has national aspirations (or used to) with no national distribution. Of the five "national" newspapers — the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Washington Post and Los Angeles Times — the L.A. Times is the only one you cannot obtain in the nation's capital. Being obtainable in some form is obviously essential to any plan for being obtained.

But mere obtainability isn't enough. People outside of Los Angeles need a reason to read The Times. Sheer excellence (of which there is plenty) is one reason, but probably not enough.

The Washington Post is also adamantly local in its distribution, but it has a huge national readership online because people want to be in on the conversation in the nation's political capital. People read the New York Times in part because it is published in the financial capital.

Los Angeles is the capital of the increasingly dominant infotainment-media-celebrity complex. Broaden your scope to California generally and you can throw in high technology as well. The L.A. Times should be the diary of this capital. Often it is. But it has to display its savvy as well as rely on it. In 2006, that means having a website second-to-none, technologically and in terms of content. Having a website that is second to almost everybody suggests that you do not have your finger on the pulse.

Many Angelenos yearn for a Graham or Sulzberger family and rue the day that the Chandlers sold out to "Chicago." And at least three local billionaires — the ubiquitous Eli, as well as David Geffen and Ron Burkle — have said they might like to own it. Former editor Carroll, from a perch at Harvard, is pushing this approach to the problems of newspapers generally.

If I were Dennis FitzSimons, chief executive of Tribune Co., and someone said, "Here is a large check. Take it and you will never have to think about the Los Angeles Times ever again," I would pinch myself, then grab it and scurry back to the Midwest before the buyer changed his mind or I woke up. But a sale to a local or locals is not likely to produce an equally happy ending for the buyer, or for Los Angeles.

Buying a newspaper is different from inheriting one. These men all made their fortunes in businesses in which the notion that owners should keep their hands off the product doesn't even have the status of an abstract piety. Inevitably a day would come (my prediction: in less than six months) when the new owner would open the paper and read something upsetting. Then he will call John Carroll and ask, "Tell me again why I'm supposed to pay for this crap?" But he won't hear the answer because he'll already be firing Dean Baquet on the other line.

I miss the Los Angeles Times. My very first day on the job, I attended the Page 1 meeting in the newsroom. There was a story about a transient who allegedly had broken into the home of a 91-year-old Hollywood screenwriter — author of "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" and later a blacklisted victim of the Red Scare — cut off his head, climbed over the back fence (head in hand), stabbed a neighbor to death, and was ultimately arrested at Paramount Studios, where guards recognized him from police photos shown on a TV they weren't supposed to be watching on the job.

What a story! But it didn't make the front page. It ran in the Metro section. I asked Carroll, "Gosh, who do you have to decapitate to make Page 1 around here?" Now we know.

[bobcat]

An interesting turn of events to be sure. Rather than once again trying to buy the LA Times from Tribune, Eli Broad and Ron Burkle are now attempting to take over Tribune itself.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

L.A. investors bid on Tribune Co.
By James Rainey
Times Staff Writer

10:25 AM PST, November 8, 2006

Billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad and prominent investor Ron Burkle submitted a bid today to buy Tribune Co. , which owns the Los Angeles Times, KTLA Channel 5 and the Chicago Cubs.

Details about the offer and the price that the duo would be willing to pay remained unclear, but the Los Angeles-based businessmen have said for months that they wanted a local group to take control of The Times.

"Affiliates of the Broad Investment Company and [Burkle's] Yucaipa Companies have submitted a competitive bid for acquisition of the entire Tribune company," a source familiar with the offer said.

Broad declined to comment and Burkle could not be reached.

Shares of Tribune rose 86 cents, or 2.72%, to close at $32.48 on the New York Stock Exchange.

The offer comes the day after it was revealed that Times Editor Dean Baquet would leave his post, culminating a long-standing dispute between the editor and the paper's Chicago parent over proposed staff reductions. A month earlier, Times Publisher Jeffrey M. Johnson was forced from his job, also largely related to his defiance of editorial staff cuts proposed by Chicago.

David Geffen, the entertainment mogul who is based in Los Angeles, has also expressed interest in acquiring the Los Angeles Times. He has talked about buying the paper himself rather than as part of a group.

Geffen was not known to have submitted an offer as of today.

All three of the Los Angeles magnates have said in the past that The Times would benefit from their stewardship because they would be willing to accept lower profits and invest in news coverage.

Tribune executives have said repeatedly that they preferred to keep The Times as part of their media conglomerate, which includes 10 other daily newspapers and 25 television stations.

The company only opened itself to bids on individual assets like The Times last week, after it received a series of low bids from several private equity firms for the company.

Broad made his fortune in the homebuilding industry and expanded it in the financial services field. He has been a key fundraiser of many civic projects, including the downtown Disney concert hall. Burkle was one of the nation's top supermarket operators and now runs Yucaipa, a firm that invests widely for both its principal and public retirement funds.

Local groups and individuals have expressed interest in acquiring other Tribune papers such as the Baltimore Sun, the Hartford Courant and Newsday, which is published on New York's Long Island.

Under pressure from shareholders because of its sagging share price, Chicago-based Tribune announced in late September that it would consider a sale or breakup of the company.

A deadline for nonbinding preliminary offers resulted in bids valued at about the company's current share price, two people familiar with the process said. That led Tribune's investment bankers to begin calling people who had expressed interest in bidding for particular assets to say such offers were now welcome.

Apparently no media companies came forward in the initial bidding. Nonbinding bids were made by several private equity firms, including Bain Capital, Carlyle Group, a partnership of Texas Pacific Group and Thomas H. Lee Partners, and an alliance of Providence Equity Partners, Madison Dearborn Partners and Apollo Partners.

Tribune faces the same challenges confronting many media companies. The circulation of its newspapers has been sliding and many advertisers have been shifting their spending to the Internet.

Newspaper websites have recorded strong growth and arguably reach more readers than their publications' print editions. But online advertisements sell for considerably less than print ads and provide only about 5% of newspaper companies' total revenue.

The Times last week reported that its weekday circulation in the six months that ended Sept. 30 was down 8% from the same period last year.

[DJM19]

That would be a sweet turn of events

[edluva]

what more do we have to save? Dean Baquet's gone. The Trib management has destroyed the Times.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-moguls9nov09,1,4372532.story?coll=la-headlines-business&track=crosspromo

Unlikely pair of bidders

Eli Broad and Ron Burkle won't want to run The Times together, acquaintances say. Neither has a background in newspapers.


By Kim Christensen, Robin Abcarian and Christopher Reynolds
Times Staff Writers

November 9, 2006

Eli Broad made his fortune building affordable homes for Southern Californians, while Ron Burkle made his by filling their pantries with groceries.

On Wednesday, they joined in a bid to buy the Los Angeles Times' parent, Tribune Co. If successful, the two billionaires with no newspaper experience might pull off one of their most audacious deals yet.

Broad and Burkle have spent millions cutting separate swaths across the landscape of Southern California arts, culture and philanthropy. Their bid is likely to be countered by another local billionaire, David Geffen, who is expected to make a separate offer for the newspaper.

Like Geffen, who made his fortune in music and movies, Broad and Burkle have egos to match their accomplishments. Some who know them question whether they could work well together as partners, prompting speculation they would divvy Tribune's holdings of newspapers, broadcast outlets and the Chicago Cubs baseball team.

"The obvious question on everyone's mind is where does the L.A. Times end up in all this? In whose hands and under whose direction?" said Steve Soboroff, president of Playa Vista, a former Los Angeles mayoral candidate and one of 20 community leaders who in September wrote to Tribune Co. protesting its plans for cutbacks at The Times. "There are all kinds of possibilities."

Former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, who is an acquaintance of Burkle's and hikes with Broad in the Santa Monica Mountains almost every Sunday, said he was not surprised to hear about the pair's proposal.

Buying Tribune would be "an interesting game," said Riordan, a multimillionaire venture capitalist who restructured Mattel Co. before going into politics.

"The part that would be fun would be selling off the parts of Tribune and being left with the L.A. Times," he said. "But then what would you do?"

Riordan doubts that Broad and Burkle, both of whom have strong personalities, would be interested in running The Times as co-owners.

Two people who know both men in business and civic circles agreed. They described Broad and Burkle as "control freaks" but asked that their names not be used because they didn't want to antagonize the billionaires.

"There is no way they are gonna live together running that newspaper," said one, who described them as "not friends but not enemies" either.

"Knowing them," he added, "they better divvy it up before they make the deal and not after. And they are both gonna want the cream. If you live in L.A., the L.A. Times is the cream."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Broad, 73, the only child of Lithuanian immigrants, was born in New York and raised in Detroit, where his father was a house painter and the owner of several dime stores. At age 20, he became Michigan's youngest certified public accountant.

In 1957, he co-founded Kaufman & Broad Home Corp., which grew into the largest builder of moderately priced homes in the West. He later bought Sun Insurance Co. and made billions when American International Group Inc. bought the company, then SunAmerica, in 1998.

By then Broad was a longtime resident of Los Angeles, where he has immersed himself — and a good chunk of his fortune, which Forbes has put at $5.8 billion — in arts groups and civic organizations.

In the last two years alone, he has contributed more than $60 million to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, where he is a board member, and which is now putting up a new contemporary art building bearing his name. Broad led the fundraising for Walt Disney Concert Hall, pitching in $18 million of his own money. He has also been a central figure in the effort to revive Grand Avenue as a cultural and economic force downtown.

Although few would question Broad's generosity, some in the Los Angeles business community wonder privately whether he is serious about buying Tribune. Among other things, they cite his prominent mention as a likely buyer of the Los Angeles Dodgers when News Corp. put the team up for sale several years ago. Some questioned whether he was serious when he made an 11th-hour bid to buy the team if Bostonian Frank McCourt did not make good on his offer.

How ownership of The Times by men who have been covered regularly in its news pages — and not always flatteringly — would play out is hard to gauge, said Marty Kaplan, associate dean of the USC Annenberg School for Communication.

Some moguls, such as New York Daily News owner Mort Zuckerman, "buy a newspaper because they want it to be an extension of their voice and views," Kaplan said. By contrast, the Graham family, controlling owners of the Washington Post, "voluntarily erect walls between their ownership and their power to influence the paper."

Refraining from meddling in coverage can be very difficult for owners, he said.

"I know if I owned a paper, I would find it very hard to read unflattering coverage of myself or my friends and not want to pick up the phone," Kaplan said. "One would like to think that Mr. Broad and Mr. Burkle … understand that for The Times to thrive, they have to voluntarily manacle themselves."


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Burkle, 53, made his first fortune in the supermarket business. The son of a Stater Bros. executive, he was a vice president at age 29 when he put together an unsuccessful bid to buy the chain. Burkle multiplied his wealth by buying, merging and selling supermarket chains including Ralphs Grocery Co. and Food4Less. Forbes has estimated his wealth at $2.5 billion.

Burkle, who heads Los Angeles-based Yucaipa Cos., also built a record of social and community responsibility through his Food4Less Foundation, which gained a reputation as one of the most active philanthropic groups in Southern California.

He made an unsuccessful bid this year for 12 Knight Ridder Corp. newspapers when that company was broken up.


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Geffen has made no secret of his interest in acquiring The Times.

Like Broad and Burkle, he has donated millions, including a pledge in 2002 of $200 million to the UCLA Medical School, which now bears his name.

Geffen, who is worth $4.6 billion according to Forbes, made his money buying and selling record companies in the 1970s and '80s. In 1994, along with Jeffrey Katzenberg and Steven Spielberg, he launched a new studio, DreamWorks SKG.

With a few hundred million dollars, Geffen has quietly built one of the best collections of postwar contemporary art in the country, consisting of fewer than 50 works that he mostly keeps in his Beverly Hills, Malibu and Manhattan homes, rarely lending to museums. He favors abstract expressionism and Pop Art from the late 1940s to the late 1960s, including works by Jackson Pollock, Jasper Johns and Willem de Kooning.

In the last two months, he has sold three artworks for a combined $283.5 million, fueling speculation that he is raising cash to buy The Times. These include the $140-million sale this month of a Jackson Pollock drip painting that stands as the costliest art sale ever made public.

*


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kim.christensen@latimes.com

robin.abcarian@latimes.com

christopher.reynolds@la times.com

*

(INFOBOX BELOW)

Eli Broad

Net worth:



$5.8 billion

Source of wealth:

Home building, financial services

Philanthropy: The 73-year-old has given $60 million for a new Los Angeles County Museum of Art gallery, $23.2 million for an art center at UCLA and millions to Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Caltech, Pitzer College and USC.

In the news: In 2005, he paid $23.8 million for David Smith's "Cubi XXVIII," the highest price for a contemporary artwork sold at auction.

Sources: Forbes, Times research by Scott Wilson

**

Ron Burkle

Net worth:



$2.5 billion

Source of wealth:



Buying, selling and merging supermarkets

Philanthropy: The 53-year-old has donated $25 million to UCLA Medical Center and $10 million for an international relations center at UCLA and has given to Walt Disney Concert Hall.

In the news: In March, he videotaped New York Post gossip writer Jared Paul Stern allegedly trying to extort more than $200,000 from the mogul.

**

David Geffen

Net worth:



$4.6 billion

Source of wealth:

Music and movies

Philanthropy: The 63-year-old has pledged $200 million to UCLA's medical school (now the David Geffen School of Medicine) and given $5 million to UCLA's Westwood Playhouse (now the Geffen Playhouse).

In the news: In 2005, he gave up a three-year legal fight to block public beach access next to his Malibu home.

Sources: Forbes, Times research by Scott Wilson

[LosAngelesBeauty]

A Chandler's advice for the L.A. Times

The newspaper can only thrive if its owners and editors make drastic changes.

By Harry B. Chandler
Harry B. Chandler has been a media executive in film, TV, the Internet and at The Times.

November 12, 2006

FOR MONTHS, many of us have been wringing our hands about the situation at the Los Angeles Times. And last week, when Tribune Co. forced out Editor Dean Baquet, it only underscored how dire the situation is at the newspaper. As a member of the Chandler family, which founded and controlled this institution for nearly 120 years, I have found these events to be particularly troubling.

First, let me clear up misconceptions about "the Chandler family." It is not a small group that meets at "the club" on Sundays, but rather 170 living descendants of Harry Chandler and his wife, Marian, who established the trusts that controlled The Times and its corporate cousins until the sale to Tribune in 2000. Many members of this extended family live outside Southern California; most are not named Chandler. Although many of us have a financial interest in Tribune, only eight sit on the board that makes decisions about the trust. I believe only seven, including me, have worked at The Times.

My point is that a family of this size, largely personally disconnected from this newspaper, is unlikely to act in concert toward a solution for The Times. What a shame that is.

For what it's worth, my view — as a shareholder, former employee and namesake of Harry Chandler, the paper's second publisher — is that The Times is not terminally ill, nor are most newspapers. Like radio after the arrival of TV, newspapers will evolve, redefine themselves and, yes, perhaps shrink as the Internet lures away readers.

This evolution has already produced unfortunate casualties, and it will continue to do so. The Times has weathered reduced coverage, an unprecedented turnover of key staff, a nearly 50% workforce reduction and a companywide morale decline. If we allow this to continue, we will be left without the news coverage Los Angeles needs and has come to rely on. Other local broadcast, print and Internet media can't pick up the slack; their reporting staffs combined are a fraction of The Times'.

After decades of editorial improvement, growing readership and profitability, how did this reversal of fortunes occur? The migration of readers and advertisers to the Internet is afflicting all newspapers, but a series of regrettable mistakes accelerated The Times' problems. I place the epicenter in the late '90s with the appointments of two executives/publishers, Mark H. Willes and Kathryn M. Downing, who had no media experience. They undervalued the Internet revolution and initiated a series of failed experiments that led to dissatisfaction and an exodus of editorial and business staff, myself included. Then, rather than hire new executives, the Chandler family trust board reached out to Tribune and unexpectedly sold The Times and its sister publications.

Tribune's "larger is better" synergy plan appears to be faring no better. There have been more missteps, including circulation overstatements, a pullback from Internet initiatives and unsuccessful growth strategies from Tribune's chief executive. Over five years, Tribune has sent three publishers to The Times with mandates for short-term profit targets that could only be achieved by staff and quality reductions. Meanwhile, the value of the Tribune stock that my family trusts received in the sale has declined by about 40%.

How can The Times recover? To offset declining revenues, it needs to reduce expenses with the least effect on its editorial mission. One idea is an a la carte newspaper — one that delivers stock tables, sports sections or comics only to the subscribers who want them. This would require re-engineering printing and distribution systems at some expense, but it would offer substantial newsprint savings.

The time also has come to more aggressively consolidate national and international bureaus so that they serve multiple newspapers, as former Times editorial page editor Michael Kinsley suggested in these pages several weeks ago.

But it is declining readership that requires truly innovative (some would say heretical) moves. I would propose aligning editors' compensation with the success of the sections they steward. Start by measuring the impact of certain coverage or columns, which is more complicated than simply sizing up popularity with readers. It wouldn't be easy. But with benchmarks established, editors could be given incentives to fill their pages with must-read stories that make water-cooler conversations and e-mails buzz. These, rather than winning Pulitzers, should be the paper's editorial goals.

In this era of multiple news sources, all next-day newspapers should shift their emphasis from duplicated news — such as national and world news and sports — to enterprise stories, analysis and exclusives. Weeklies such as Time, Newsweek and Sports Illustrated learned this years ago. The Times should become the indispensable source about Southern California, even if that means reducing staff in Washington and New York. Publish only columnists with original, even provocative, perspectives. Pursue more investigative pieces and assign fewer reporters to a story that 75% of readers already saw on ESPN or CNN or Yahoo.

Growing readership increasingly means reaching an audience electronically. Latimes.com has been a follower, not a leader, having turned over decision-making to the Chicago management. This needs to change.

A succession of publishers and editors who don't know an Amber Alert from a SigAlert have been parachuted in to run The Times. The paper needs executives who understand the area. Providing great editorial coverage and civic leadership for this, the largest, most complicated urban space in the world, are tasks unsuited to outsiders whose tour of duty in the Southland may not outlast the Santa Anas.

When was the last time the paper initiated a new local event, like the Festival of Books? Or led a campaign for civic improvement? The Times can continue the proud local legacy it had under my family's leadership, but not with executives who don't understand and foresee the city's needs.

Although Tribune seems unlikely to sell The Times, as that would run counter to its big-market media strategy, an independent committee of the board of directors is reviewing bids for this and other Tribune properties as you read this.

We all should be worried about the possibility of a sale to an even more profit-squeezing new owner, or some ego-driven entrepreneur with an agenda. Heck, my great-great-grandfather, Harrison Gray Otis, who bought the Times in 1882, was that type of guy, and it took half a century for my father, Otis Chandler, to undo that personal-pulpit legacy and make The Times the great newspaper it is.

Maybe it is best to look beyond corporate or private equity owners. Like professional sports teams, newspapers are trophy properties, able to create instant stature for their owners. The price is usually less-than double-digit returns. Perhaps a "benevolent billionaire" will rescue The Times. Sadly, my family trust appears not to be interested.

Another sports ownership example worth contemplating is community ownership, like that of the Green Bay Packers football team. Article I of its bylaws states, "This association shall be a community project, intended to promote community welfare … its purposes shall be exclusively charitable." Sound appealing? If 20% of Times readers invest $1,000, it could work. I'll write the first check for the Los Angeles Times Community Owners LLC.

Hang in there, Times staffers and readers. There can be a winning season again for this institution, but only if the owners change, or their playbook does.

[cookiejarvis]

Uh, that was like an op-ed two Sundays ago.

BTW, anyone care to comment on the hostile makeover of the L.A. Weekly by Village Voice Media? About the same time that the Tribune was firing Dean Baquet, another newsroom bloodbath was taking place up in Hollywood:

http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2006/11/big_turmoil_at_the_weekly.php

L.A. Observed

November 1, 2006

Big turmoil at the Weekly
Kevin Roderick

News editor Alan Mittelstaedt is out and controversial columnist Jill Stewart is coming in to edit local news coverage. Mittelstaedt pushed the recent story on Miguel Contreras's death and has had a lot to do with the improved coverage of Los Angeles city hall and politics, including the hiring of David Zahniser. Mittelstaedt was described to me as the Weekly editor most like the New Times crowd — the least knee-jerk liberal and most likely to enjoy yanking chains — but apparently was not liked by Village Voice Media editor-in-chief Mike Lacey. Stewart, however, is more ideological than many of the current news reporters at the Weekly but not liberal and she was a Lacey favorite as a columnist at the old New Times Los Angeles. Her name has been circulating around the newsroom since last week.

[Vangelist]

what more do we have to save? Dean Baquet's gone. The Trib management has destroyed the Times.

It's not like we can't *ever* find another editor of merit to replace him; we don't need to be eternally pessimistic here. What's that going to accomplish?

The "Village Voice Media" is pure sacrilege...how can these New Times people even call themselves that when over the past 12 months they systematically DESTROYED the Village Voice? Firing so many of its key staff and reporters who were fixtures for decades, like Robert Christgau, who practically invented rock criticism, or nearly causing others to quit, like political columnist Nat Hentoff. What is ironic beyond comprehension is that these assholes, including Lacey, are CONSERVATIVES, who have managed to take over the liberal-by-definition institution of the "alt-weekly," - across the nation.

Watch for the gutting of the LA Weekly to follow now. It'll be very disheartening to see how this Jill woman is going to try and push it in a subtly "conservative" direction...

[edluva]

what more do we have to save? Dean Baquet's gone. The Trib management has destroyed the Times.

It's not like we can't *ever* find another editor of merit to replace him; we don't need to be eternally pessimistic here. What's that going to accomplish?


I'm being about as pessimistic as you are in describing the Village Voice. Dean Baquet isn't the only casualty of Trib management. Count notables Jeff Johnson, John Carroll, Manohla Dargis, Robert Scheer, Robert Reigh, and Robin Wright along with him and you'll see some reason for pessimism. One look at the front page and you'll see the loss of focus. The LAT is now a shitty rag along the lines of the Trib and Register. It's going to need serious work even if we do get it back

[Vangelist]

Can we really blame the Trib for the departure of Dargis, for I heard she was bought off by the NYT? There may be more to the story involving the Trib, but you can't count out how the vultures at NYT look at all this as golden opportunities for their recruitment efforts. And I'm less pessimistic that the LAT will find an editor in time than something like LA Weekly, since the age of the "alt"-weekly is basically over, with corporations buying them wholesale. As far as the LAT is concerned though, I think local ownership - if/when it happens - can start turning things around again. It's not as if it was a great paper a generation ago - just a few years prior, and we must believe we can start achieving that again with the riight leadership.

[edluva]

.

[edluva]

I guess it's a tougher call with Dargis. One can only speculate as to her motivations. Maybe the prestige was too hard to resist - she still writes from LA. But the cut-throat competition has been a constant between the LAT and NYT. They've been rivals for years, so nothing new there. LA continued to pull off a slew of pulitzers, outdoing the NYT in spite of it. I can already say though that the Trib was directly responsible for the losses of Scheer, Carroll, Baquet, Johnson, and Wright and that is traumatic in its own right. It takes years to build the kind of journalistic respectability that's been lost almost overnight it seems.

[LosAngelesBeauty]

Geffen's offer for The Times: $2 billion


By James Rainey
Times Staff Writer

December 14, 2006

Entertainment mogul David Geffen has made a $2-billion all-cash offer for the Los Angeles Times, but the newspaper's corporate owner has declined to accept or reject the bid as it continues to seek offers for the entire company, a source said.

Geffen made the formal offer last month to Tribune Co. but was told by representatives of the Chicago-based media conglomerate that they would not consider it until they had fielded offers for all of Tribune, according to a source familiar with the interaction who requested anonymity because the matter is confidential.

Several private equity firms, newspaper giant Gannett Co. and an alliance of Los Angeles billionaires, Eli Broad and Ron Burkle, have expressed preliminary interest in owning Tribune.

But none of those parties have come forward with a formal offer, forcing Tribune to extend an auction that was to end this month into the new year.

Several observers said the paucity of interest in Tribune had increased the chance that the company would be forced to consider selling individual assets, which include the Los Angeles newspaper, KTLA-TV Channel 5, the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Cubs and 22 other television stations.

Members of California's Chandler family prompted the auction this summer when they complained that the value of the company, in which they hold 20% of the stock, had been depressed by poor management.

The Chandlers are now trying to line up other investors for a joint bid on Tribune, according to an investment advisor familiar with the auction.

Geffen has told many friends and associates for more than a year that he would like to own the Los Angeles newspaper and improve the paper as a service to Los Angeles.

The 63-year-old tycoon has also said that he has enough liquid assets to buy the paper alone and pay cash.

His net worth is estimated at $4.6 billion.

Representatives of Broad and Burkle have argued that it would be better for the community if The Times went to a broader partnership, so that no single individual had too great an influence over the paper.

*


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james.rainey@latimes.com

[Buckeye Native 001]

I'd really like it if the Times focused on local issues more, but what do I know, huh? :shrug:

[Chase Unperson]

I'd really like it if the Times focused on local issues more, but what do I know, huh? :shrug:


Will then you like Tribune ownership as that is their goal.

[Buckeye Native 001]

How long have they owned the Times? Haven't seen much attention given to what's happening in/around L.A. beyond the goings-on in whatever red carpet celebrity parade happens weekly in this town.

[edluva]

Will then you like Tribune ownership as that is their goal.

Just that Trib especially sucks at doing it. I think it's ironic that taken alone, LAT has been the most profitable of Tribs assets, both before and after Trib took over wherease Tribs remaining subsidiaries have been perennial losers and it's stock has been a perennial tanker. Kinda says something about their strategy doesn't it?