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Monday mornings will be different

By JOE CHILDS
Published June 3, 2007

First, a thank you.

I appreciate the good thinking and the careful comments some of you passed along after I announced last Sunday that we are restructuring our local news report on Mondays.

The change we are making is significant. The section you are holding won't be in your paper tomorrow or on any following Monday.

We are combining this section on Mondays with Section B, Local & State. We concluded after extensive study that on Mondays we can give you the local content you want and need with one local section rather than two. On the other six days of the week, this section and Local & State will continue to be separate parts of your Times.

As I explained last Sunday, Mondays are unique for us. Sunday news cycles often are slow. So, to fill two local Monday sections, our news teams worked in advance, developing content that had shelf life to hold until Mondays.

Doing that twice, once for this community section and again for Local & State, tended to pull us toward a focus on quantity.

Combining the two sections allows us the strike the proper balance of enterprising work and urgent next-day coverage. Also important: We can change our work-flow patterns during the week, shifting the priority away from quantity and more toward quality.

It's a prudent realignment during these times of challenge for our industry. To continue serving you at the highest levels, we must self- examine, looking for smart opportunities to adjust on other levels.

Perhaps it sounds paradoxical to suggest we can better serve you by taking away a news section. One reader called me last week and challenged that point. In so many words, she suggested we are guilty of self-deception to suggest less could be more.

Our aim is to capitalize on our strengths. To do the rigorous work you expect from us.

That takes time. We tended to overtask ourselves in producing two local sections on Monday and perhaps overpromised you. This restructuring allows us to redeploy during the week to target the work you most want - and we most want to deliver.

Back to Mondays. We vowed to do more than merely combine this community section with Local & State. Our many discussions led us to design a fresh approach to presenting local news. It's a section with a unique personality, one we think is well-suited to Mondays.

We purposely will work on Mondays to give you a strong local report, but our Monday-specific design will require no more of your time than necessary.

Our new section, called Monday Metro, will have serious news coverage. Its story presentation, however, will be a bit different. Our bias will be to keep stories as short as possible on Mondays, when you are pressed for time.

Monday Metro also will continue to carry enterprising work. The storytelling, though, often will be a bit different, too. It will be more visually driven to quicken your reading.

Monday Metro will have other surprises. It will look ahead to the coming week, providing information you can use to plan and prepare.

It's a design we think is right for Mondays. We will be eager to get your reaction.

Reach Joe Childs at childs@sptimes.com and at (727) 445-4186.

[Last modified June 3, 2007, 08:04:45]