THE guys Mayor Michael Bloomberg left behind to run his old shop, media giant Bloomberg L.P., are going on a witch hunt to find out who the gripers and complainers in their midst may be.
Bloomberg’s North American editor, Ted Merz, has asked his group leaders – basically editors in charge of specific reporting beats – to compile a list of the unhappy reporters and editors, according to a source close to the situation. Presumably, he’s turning it over to Bloomberg Editor-in-Chief Matthew Winkler.
“Nobody knows what Merz plans to do with the list, but they find it very, very creepy,” said the source.
“There isn’t enough paper in a printer to print out that list,” quipped one insider, who said the employees since Mike left constitute “a very unhappy, low morale work force.”
Merz would neither confirm nor deny that a list of disgruntled employees is being drawn up. “I don’t know,” he said. “I have no comment on that. You have to talk to (company spokeswoman) Chris Taylor.” He then hung up the phone, forgetting to say, “Have a nice day.”
Taylor said she had no knowledge of such a list. “We do ask reporters if they are interested in changing their beats and have done that forever. That’s just good management, isn’t it?”
Meanwhile, the union that is trying to organize the 2,200 workers in the New York headquarters said it will expand its union organizing efforts to the Princeton, N.J., site, as well.
“My phone has been ringing off the hook with Bloomberg employees calling me,” said Patricia Hoffman, senior organizer and business rep of the Office and Professional Employees International Union, Local 153 of the AFL-CIO.
Originally, she was only targeting the New York office, where 2,200 of the company’s 8,200 employees work. “In a week or so, we’ll set up meetings in New York and Princeton,” said Hoffman.
Taylor said, “No one knows anything about that.”
Last Wednesday’s story in Media Ink said that Princeton, N.J. employees were grumbling about mandatory 10-hour days that had recently been instituted at that site. A source close to the situation said that the policy has since been rescinded.
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Tabloid king David Pecker, far from taking the customary snooze after devouring a company, is continuing to shake things up at the American Media headquarters in Boca Raton, Fla. and at the newly acquired Weider Publications in Woodland Hills, Calif.
He’s also banged out a two-million copy commemorative on the Columbia shuttle disaster that starts hitting newsstands today.
Pecker said that he will donate 50 cents from every copy sold to a fund the benefit the seven astronauts’ families. He expects that to amount to about $750,000.
In the latest, maneuver at Weider, Pecker is trying to replace the decimated upper executive ranks created when he fired Weider President & CEO Russell Denson and the entire executive team. Barbara Harris, who has been editor of Shape for the past 15 years, has moved upstairs to become executive vice president/editorial director of the group that includes Shape, Fit Pregnancy and Natural Health. Anne Russell, who was the editorial director of Shape under Harris, moves into the top job at Shape as editor-in-chief.
Designer Roger Black, who just finished the Los Angeles Times redesign, has been commissioned to overhaul the design of Natural Health, which plans to rev up newsstand circulation to battle Rodale’s Organic Style.
Meanwhile, in Pecker’s tabloid wing, he apparently has had second thoughts about turning over Star magazine to Candace Trunzo. She gets to keep the editor-in-chief title but will be superseded by Editorial Director Tony Frost, who was a group editor for Star and the Globe.
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At Bonnie Fuller’s Us Weekly, the people continue to come and go – not necessarily speaking of Michelangelo.
The latest out the door is Gabriel Snyder, who only joined nine months ago because he was tired of covering media for the New York Observer, where he was co-authoring the Off the Record Column. Now, he’s quitting to go cover media – this time in Hollywood for Variety.