LAist to cut 21 positions, citing revenue shortfall
Southern California Public Radio, which runs local station LAist (formerly known as KPCC), said Tuesday that it would cut staff by more than 10% because of a revenue shortfall.
In a note to employees, President and Chief Executive Herb Scannell announced the elimination of 21 positions as part of a restructuring. Scannell said the cuts are also part of an effort to accelerate growth in digital media.
Scannell described the retrenchment as an effort to better deliver on SCPR’s “cross-platform, public service mission.” SCPR owns and operates the LAist website, podcast producer LAist Studios as well as its local radio station that broadcasts at 89.3 FM.
The move was intended as a step toward creating “a sustainable business model for an increasingly digital future,” he wrote.
LAist’s report on the layoffs said cutbacks primarily involve administrative staff, producers and technicians. The shortfall had much to do with softness in the advertising business and a pullback of promotional efforts by Hollywood studios amid the writers’ strike.
The report noted that LAist is paring its podcasting initiatives, a business that has struggled recently.
L.A.’s most popular public radio station, KPCC, is changing its name to LAist 89.3.
LAist’s contraction comes amid a devastating economy for news organizations, which have been forced to cut hundreds of journalists’ jobs.
Last week, the Los Angeles Times announced that it was cutting 74 newsroom positions, also due to a budget gap. (The number of layoffs was reduced to 73 after a team leader volunteered to depart.) On Monday, the New York Times announced that it was cutting 20 jobs from the Athletic, its sports news site, representing 4% of its staff.
In the last year, the Washington Post, CNN, MSNBC, NPR, Vice Media and Insider have laid off journalists. BuzzFeed News and MTV News have shut down. NPR, which supplies programming to LAist, cut 10% of its workforce in February. Spotify has slashed roles from its podcast division.
“While we’ve managed to reduce spending and mitigate costs in the past year, that approach is no longer feasible in the new fiscal year,” Scannell wrote in his message. “We need to reallocate resources to maintain a consistent digital presence. This involves giving priority to digital-first reporting and strengthening our audience development efforts moving forward.”
LAist’s fiscal year ends June 30. Earlier this month, it held a membership fundraising drive and announced on air that it had met its goal.
According to a recent tax filing, Southern California Public Radio posted revenue of $42 million for the 2021-22 fiscal year, representing an increase of 13% over the previous fiscal year, when the organization reported $37 million in revenue.
Scannell, through a spokesperson, declined to comment beyond the memo. The spokesperson said in a statement: “We are reallocating resources to prioritize our digital offerings and capabilities, enabling us to attract and serve a growing, loyal audience.”
Merida told more than 550 Times employees that the paper was facing a budget hole of “tens of millions of dollars.” Angry staff members protested cuts to the newsroom.
At least seven members of the station’s guild, part of the SAG-AFTRA union, were included in the layoffs.
Guild representatives, in a statement, said they were outraged by the cuts, which were announced during a morning staff meeting.
“For months, we have heard about how the company was able to manage our budget shortfall,” guild members said, noting that contributions from listeners helped the station hit its most recent fundraising benchmark.
“Our company says the ‘restructuring’ will help us become more ‘cross-platform’ and be more of a digital newsroom — yet valuable colleagues in podcasts and digital teams are being laid off,” the guild continued. “We’ve also lost people who were invaluable in getting reporting across these platforms.”
Staff members who lost their jobs will be offered severance packages and “other resources to support their transition,” Scannell’s memo said.
“While being able to balance the books is a fundamental requirement of our business, these changes optimally position us to succeed in a competitive digital landscape,” Scannell wrote. “To that end, we are posting several new roles in the coming days, and we anticipate adding new roles in the next fiscal year to accelerate our digital transition.”
Separately, several journalists working for dot.LA, a once-ambitious outlet that strived to cover Los Angeles’ tech startup scene, posted on Twitter that the small editorial staff had been jettisoned this week and that their email accounts were shut down.
In an internal memo viewed by The Times, the head of the dot.LA venture, which had about seven editorial employees, said the group planned to shift its focus to its newsletter product.
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