Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Las Vegas Sun to rise with morning R-J

Sinking circulation for afternoon paper drives publications to change operating agreement

Brian Greenspun, Las Vegas Sun president and editor, talks in his office Tuesday about the move his newspaper will make from the afternoon to morning delivery with the Review-Journal. He said the Sun remains a core interest of the Greenspun family. Photo by John Locher.

In a deal that will transform local print journalism, the afternoon Las Vegas Sun newspaper instead will become a six- to 10-page daily newspaper delivered each morning with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, executives with the two publications announced Tuesday.

Since July 1, 1990, the Review-Journal and Sun have operated under a joint operating agreement in which the Sun published a weekday afternoon edition and small sections inside the morning Review-Journal on weekends and holidays.

Under a revision of that 15-year-old agreement, on or before Sept. 30, the Henderson-based Sun no longer will publish in the afternoons but will appear in a condensed version seven days a week within the pages of the Review-Journal.

"If you buy into the concept that the purpose of a joint operating agreement is to provide the community with two voices, we were getting to the point where if a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it," Review-Journal Publisher Sherman R. Frederick said of the Sun, whose circulation has dipped from approximately 42,000 subscribers in 2003 to 28,000.

"It became clear to us early on that an afternoon slot was tough to hold up," Frederick said.

Sun President and Editor Brian Greenspun said the deal will give his publication greater editorial freedom and a larger readership.

"Las Vegas is going to be far better for this," Greenspun said Tuesday afternoon, about 40 minutes after he finished breaking the news to the Sun's approximately 80 full-time workers. "You've got two very different voices, two newspapers who see the world differently, and the readers will be able to take advantage of that input and use it to make better decisions."

The revised joint operating agreement, which was finalized Friday, should benefit both newspapers, Frederick and Greenspun said.

The Review-Journal will save money by eliminating the need to market, print and deliver a full version of the Sun to subscribers each afternoon.

The Sun will reach a wider audience thanks to the Review-Journal's weekday subscriber base of approximately 165,000.

Sunday's combined Review-Journal/Sun currently reaches 240,000 readers per week, Frederick said.

Greenspun added: "Whether it's one page, eight pages or 80 pages, the Las Vegas Sun is still the core of who we are (as a family). I frankly can't imagine our being here without this newspaper, which is one of the reasons why this deal was attractive to us. It certainly keeps us around for the next 35 years ... in a way where we have greater input into what happens in this community."

The Review-Journal/Sun joint operating agreement expires in 2040.

Greenspun said it's too soon to tell what the new Sun will look like, but he said it no longer will function as a "newspaper of record" that documents most important events in the community.

"When you have two newspapers in the same package, it's redundant to have two stories about the same baseball game, two stories about the same County Commission meeting or two stories about the same unfortunate car accident," Greenspun said.

But that does not mean the Sun no longer will cover a variety of topics.

"You can't neglect sports, you can't neglect business. We wouldn't even think of giving up environmental writing: Yucca Mountain, air and water quality," Greenspun said.

"All of that stuff will be covered, but probably not in the same traditional sense that it has."

Greenspun would not address how many of the Sun's approximately 80 newsroom employees would be displaced by the change, but he conceded some jobs would be lost because of the smaller size.

Where possible, he hopes to shift workers to the Greenspun family's other media operations.

"While there's still some uncertainty about their specific jobs, I don't think there's any uncertainty that what we're doing is good for the newspaper and good for the community," Greenspun said of his staff.

Several Sun employees declined requests to speak on the pending changes Tuesday afternoon.

But a longtime employee was overheard asking an executive whether a voluntary reduction of her weekly hours would ensure she would keep her job.

And as a pair of reporters angrily walked toward their cars, one shouted that Tuesday's news was only "good for the R-J."

Several Nevada leaders reacted to news of the change Tuesday as a positive development that would give Southern Nevadans more exposure to a different community voice.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, who is regularly blasted by Sun columnist Jon Ralston, disagreed.

"Hank Greenspun was a fearless journalist and great credit to what Las Vegas is all about. I don't feel that way about the present Sun," Goodman said. "I'm not happy about this. The Sun now picks up a certain degree of credibility. I don't want it to have the imprimatur of the R-J."

Nevada historian Hal Rothman said Hank Greenspun, who died in 1989, would be pleased.

"That his little rag he bought ... for a nickel and a dime would now reach as broad a readership as any daily in the valley would make him proud," Rothman said. "The R-J will not be the only editorial voice ... and that's a good thing."

Politicians both Democratic and Republican also praised the development.

"I'm glad that more people will now be able to read an alternative to the R-J editorial page," said state Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas.

Gov. Kenny Guinn said he believes the development is a positive improvement of the newspapers' relationship.

"The JOA has worked out better than people thought it would because (the Sun has) the freedom to say what they want," said Guinn, a Republican.

Guinn, a friend of the late Hank Greenspun, said he believed the former publisher would have signed off on the deal.

"He was a very progressive individual. He would look at those figures and say (28,000 versus 165,000) and say how can I best utilize that," Guinn said.

The Sun in summer 2000 moved into a third-floor office near Green Valley Parkway and the Las Vegas Beltway in Henderson. Greenspun said it will remain there despite the downsizing.

That site is next to the headquarters of several other Greenspun-family holdings, including American Nevada Co., a land developer whose projects include Green Valley and Seven Hills; Vegas.com, an online travel reservation service; and Greenspun Media Group, whose publications include In Business Las Vegas, ShowBiz Weekly, and Las Vegas Weekly, an alternative newspaper.

Greenspun said Tuesday's deal would have little effect on the family's other media outlets.

Since 1981, the Greenspun family has co-owned HBC Publications, parent company of the weekly Henderson Home News and Boulder City News, with the family of former Nevada Gov. Mike O'Callaghan.

O'Callaghan died in March 2004, and his son and daughter, Tim O'Callaghan and Mary Colleen O'Callaghan-Miele, have continued to operate the company with Brian Greenspun.

"We do not yet know what we're going to be, how we're going to present our news and information, what (the section) is going to look like," Greenspun said. "It will evolve over time."