Posted on 01/20/2009 12:20:37 PM PST by abb
Nearly a dozen Star Tribune employees who took the company's buyout money learned last night that their five-figure checks will bounce if cashed.
Mike Bucsko, executive officer of the newsroom's Newspaper Guild, says company officials told between nine and 11 Stribbers that "their checks were not going to be honored. They're not going to go through."
It's a nightmare scenario for workers who gave up their jobs for a lump sum that could now be a lump of coal. Last year, bought-out Tribune Co. workers found promissory notes turned into unsecured bankruptcy claims after the Chicago Tribune parent filed Chapter 11.
Stribbers no doubt had that disaster in mind when they signed up for the buyout in the first week of January. Five to seven cashed their checks immediately upon receipt Jan. 9, and Bucsko says they got their money. He's not sure why those now holding the bag didn't do the same thing. At stake for all those bought out: the Strib's promise to pay three months of health insurance.
The problem could be a temporary one; Bucsko says the company has stated they want to honor the severance checks, but now needs court permission to do so. That could come today, when New York bankruptcy Judge Robert D. Drain will review the company's three-month plan to continue operations. The judge will weigh the company's proposed spending against the interests of workers — and creditors who may want as much cash as possible to be preserved.
If all goes completely to hell, skunked Strib workers could retain the option to rescind their buyouts; I think there's a two-week reconsideration period that would expire Jan. 23. But fewer buyouts could make more workers subject to layoffs.
ping
LOL
ping
So much for the mileage the left is going to be able to get with lines like, “Those greedy Republican Conservatives that run corporations...” after this.
LMAO
Couldn’t happen to a more deserving bunch of propagandists and fifth columnists for Vladimir Lenin’s world view.
I had to stop reading the Strib about 18 months ago. I don't see how this can leave an uglier mark than what the Strib's editors, reporters and columnists have left over these last 40 years or so.
http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/090120/business_us_newyorktimes_shares.html?.v=1
New York Times falls on Slim’s expensive loan
Even if their checks bounced they were paid more than they were worth.
Those first “five to seven” that beat a path to cash their check have at least one brain cell among them.
http://www.thebigmoney.com/articles/impressions/2009/01/20/slim-pickings
Slim Pickings
The New York Times’ new financing is desperate but not necessarily bad.
http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=131&aid=157247
Let Debate Begin on Government Funding of News
The stories you posted the last day or so about this deal all listed the interest rate at 10%..now, we find out it is 14%..Slim had them by the short hairs, and squeezed...
http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/2009/01/16/03
The Swedish Model
January 16, 2009
As talk of bailouts abound, some in the media are asking “why not us?” Surely journalism is as valuable a national industry as airlines or insurance. Sweden thought so when it bailed out its newspapers back in the 1970s. But did it work? We ask Robert Picard, director of the Media Management and Transformation Centre in Jönköping, Sweden.
I feel so sorry for these poor people. This was so cold and unfair to these folks.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha................Bwahhahaha, (snort).....LOLOLOLOLOLOL
I sure hope things work out for them.
“He’s not sure why those now holding the bag didn’t do the same thing.”
Utter, mind-boggling stupidity would be my first guess. Holding any check, let alone one from an employer in financial trouble, is madness.
Also many times people who are selling things will in casual conversations always ask where do you work because they know what companies have bad credit. I know a guy that was getting a loan to buy something and it looked like it was a done deal but the guy had to asked “Where did you say you work,” which was followed by a “Oh, well in that case we can't give you a loan because your employer is about to go under or has bad credit or something like that which ended up being a surprise to the fellow trying to get the loan.
I almost wet myself with joyous laughter!
nah nah nah nah
nah nah nah nah
hey hey hey
good-bye
11% and 14% interest. Damn. No wonder Slim was willing to loan to them. That’s getting up into credit card range.
I grew up with the Mpls Tribune (before they became the Strib) and have watched its decline for decades. Its been a dozen years since the subscription ended. The final three things that prompted me to visit their website (James Lileks’ column, good Vikings and Timberwolves coverage)have disappeared. I don’t shed a tear and won’t spare a click for them. May they go the way of Met Stadium...
poetic justice....
These left-leaning morons have been nothing but propoganda organs for Democrats, now their unionized “Guild” butts get to see what Obama’s “Change” is all going to be about....
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