LA Times parent company Tribune Company asked a Delaware bankruptcy court Wednesday to pay out bonuses to about 700 managers to the tune of $21.5 million to $66.7 million if certain cash flow targets are met. That should go over well with local editorial staff, since several weeks ago, the cable company came into shut off the cable service at one of the Orange County offices, because the bill had been delinquent for so long, sources with knowledge of the situation told me. A mid-level manager was pressured to put the bill on his personal (not company-issued AMEX) credit card and it took several rounds of back and forth with Chicago to get any resolution. “We have no comment about confusion over a cable bill in one of our bureaus,” LA Times spokeswoman Nancy Sullivan wrote in an email.
The cable issue seems emblematic of the confusion at the Times as it struggles under its bankruptcy fiilng. “It’s just not the cable,” a source told me. “A lot of freelancers and vendors are also having trouble getting paid.” Perhaps they can take a cue from the mothership’s top brass. “There can be no serious debate about whether the top 10 executives have earned their 2008 [Management Incentive Plan] awards,” the motion filed in bankruptcy court said.
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Melissa Berg says:
when is corporate America finally waking up? This is outrageous.
sarah says:
It kills me how so many companies go under and still want to pay out these bounses. I can understand paying lower level employees who were doing their job and deserve the money their earned, especially when people rely on their bonuses as their salary. But the executives who make so much money and ruin companies should not walk away with these huge bonuses. Someone needs to monitor executive pay, it's out of hand in all industries