Tribune Publishing CEOs Are Out After A Series Of Controversy: NPR
Justin Dearborn, Tribune Publishing's chairman and CEO, and Ross Levinsohn, CEO of the company's interactive division, are leaving after a series of controversies and a failure to sell the company.
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Justin Dearborn, Tribune Publishing's chairman and CEO, and Ross Levinsohn, CEO of the company's interactive division, are leaving after a series of controversies and a failure to sell the company.
Scott Olson / Getty Images
Top officials at Tribune Publishing, which owns the Chicago Tribune, The Baltimore Sun and the New York Daily News, are leaving after a wave or controversy. Those affected include the newspaper chain's CEO and the two top officials of the digital arm, according to Timothy Knight's newspaper executive, newspaper executive
"I know first-hand that delivering high-quality, Local journalism has never been more important, "Knight wrote in his memo announcing the departures. "Like many peers, Tribune newspapers have struggled to find a winning formula and have undergone repeated cuts under current ownership." The recent history of Tribune Publishing involves a series of incidents in which executives accused of enriching themselves at the expense of their journalists.
Justin Dearborn joined Tribune Publishing as CEO in February 2016 at the best of his longtime business associate Michael Ferro, who took a controlling minority stake in the company just a few weeks before. Dearborn became chairman early last year after Ferro stepped away from a formal role in light of accusations of sexual harassment lived against him by two women in Fortune magazine. Dear Dear's departure takes effect immediately
Also gone is Ross Levinsohn, a former Tribune Publishing consultant turned executive. In August 2017 he became publisher and CEO of what was then the largest and most important property: the Los Angeles Times .
Levinsohn's digital strategy alienated his newsrooms: He sought to rely on a fleet of outside writers; some would be unpaid or pay for the privilege of being posted under the company's newspaper brands. His pick for editor-in-chief in Los Angeles drew four within the newsroom, which launched what would prove to be a successful union organizing drive. (It would inspire related labs at Tribune's papers in Chicago and Virginia, which proved equally successful.)
And Levinsohn went on leave from the LA Times, never to return, after NPR reported he had been sued twice in sexual harassment cases and that he had testified under oath that he had rated the "hotness" of female colleagues as an executive at an earlier employer. Levinsohn was also accused of people interviewed for that story with making an insulting remark about gays. (Tribune launched investigations into the top editor at the New York Daily News after raising questions about complaints lodged against his conduct. The editor, Robert Moore, and several others were soon forced out.)
In February 2018, Ferro decided that Tribune would sell the LA Times to one of the company's other major stakeholders, Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, and multibillionaire. (Tribune also sold The San Diego Union-Tribune to Soon-Shiong.) LA Times LA Times has gone on a hiring spree.
As part of which the company announced Levinsohn had been cleared of any concerns of misconduct and made CEO of Tribune's digital publishing division. Levinsohn's deputy there, Mickie Rosen, had worked with him for several years. She too is leaving the company.
