A friend of The Laurel who works at the Meriden Record-Journal writes about the following changes:
Robert Mayer, the managing editor of three Record-Journal weeklies, was laid off in mid-January. He oversaw the Plainville, Southington and Berlin Citizen papers. The Plainville office was closed and the remaining staff was moved to the Southington Citizen’s offices. The Record-Journal now has local offices only in Southington, Berlin and Middlefield (The Town Times in Middlefield is the only paper not affected by the lay-offs/staff changes.) That’s down from five local offices in 2009.A full-time reporter in Plainville was also laid off as were several part-time administrative staff members. Two of the weekly editors who survived the cuts were demoted to reporters. Editor Eliot White told the R-J staff that all of the daily newspaper employees are in the budget for the remainder of 2010.
The R-J closed its North Haven Citizen office in that town a few months ago.