Boston Herald Sells To GateHouse Media For $4.5 Million

BOSTON, MA — The Boston Herald declared bankruptcy and sold the paper to GateHouse Media, Pat Purcell, the president and publisher of the newspaper, announced to the newsroom Friday, according to journalists who were there. Layoffs are expected.

"I never wanted the Herald to go out of business. I wanted this to be a two-newspaper town," Purcell said, according to Herald journalist Bob McGovern who, along with several Herald employees live-tweeted the announcement. Rupert Murdoch named Purcell publisher in 1984 when News Corp owned the paper. Purcell bought the paper a decade later.

News of the sale, reportedly for $4.5 million, has shocked journalists and media experts. And the question now is what will this mean for local news and for the Herald.

"I think at this point none of us really knows what GateHouse intends to do with the Herald. The Herald as it is does not seem to fit anything that GateHouse likes to do," said Dan Kennedy, a media expert and associate professor of journalism at Northeastern University.

GateHouse, he said, tends to be very low-cost local coverage. The Herald is smaller than it once was, but it has some high-priced columnists, a well-staffed and probably expensive sports staff, and a talented group of photographers, said Kennedy.

All of the above, along with its unique editorial voice, are valuable to the community, and if GateHouse were to eliminate any of those aspects of the Herald, he said, Boston journalism would be diminished.

The Boston Globe did not express interest in buying the paper, but GateHouse Media, which also has been buying up a number local papers across New England and beyond, including the Patriot Ledger, bought the Herald for $4.5 million in cash and some other benefits, according to reports from inside the Herald newsroom. By comparison, John Henry, owner of the Boston Red Sox, bought the Boston Globe a few years back for $70 million.

Purcell reportedly got choked up during the announcement in which he said the company had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in Delaware. He told staff he wanted to keep as many of them as possible, according to McGovern.

Matt Stout a Statehouse reporter at the Herald tweeted that the newspaper has 228 employees on staff, but GateHouse will keep just 175 of those. Purcell told the newsroom there will be no buyouts, and pensions were not guaranteed, McGovern tweeted, as the Herald's attorney said GateHouse didn't want to take on that obligation.

Some staff have been working at the paper for more than three decades.

"GateHouse will start interviewing Herald employees in January to decide who they want to keep," tweeted Stout.

The Boston Herald has been a staple since 1846 when it was a single two-sided sheet of news published by a group of Boston printers. It grew to a print circulation of 64,500, added an online component, and a radio station.

GateHouse Media is one of the largest publishers of local media in the country but has been criticized in recent years for downsizing so many of its publications. It also has gone through a number of layoffs in the past few years and consolidated reporter and editor duties. Many local GateHouse weeklies now employ essentially one reporter who also acts as an editor for the community.

"They’re extremely focused on the bottom line. They cut staffing to the bone; they really leave their papers in a place where it’s really difficult to meet the needs of their communities," said Kennedy.

But all is not completely said and done, yet.

As part of the bankruptcy process, even with a purchase agreement with GateHouse, the court requires BHI to hold an auction to allow all potential buyers an opportunity to submit competing offers, according to the Herald, which posted an article about the sale of the paper shortly after the announcement.

"If I had a nickle for every time someone predicted the Herald was about to go out of business, I'd have a lot of nickles. So I wouldn’t bet against them this time either. I just hope it’s maintained at a high enough level of staffing that it continues to be an asset to the community," said Kennedy who has been covering the media in Boston since the early 1990s.

Patch has reached out to Kirk Davis who is the CEO of GateHouse Media for comment.

Photo by Bob Holmes, Patch

Full Disclosure: Reporter Jenna Fisher previously worked for GateHouse Media.