Gannett Hiring Freeze 2022-?

Good evening,

I do a couple of Substack columns, one about the local college sports team here in Southern NM and another one about workplace ethics and customer service.

Never wanted to write for a newspaper, and that holds especially true ever since Gannett took over our local newspaper.

Before I get too long winded as I tend to do, cliffs notes version is local sports guy left in November 2022, was not replaced, nor were there any stories about HS or College sports. To that point, there was almost zero local news coverage as well.

It felt like they were on autopilot. The 2023 sports season arrived and it was arguably the most newsworthy year ever here with scandal, success and more.

Again zero stories. The job for sports reporter was posted several times and 4-6 people, mostly recent grads, applied and never got beyond an acknowledgment email.

Was there a hiring freeze with gannett, particularly small circulation papers, and with that, when there is no local person covering a particular section of the paper, do they not have the capacity to allow the general reporters to cover a major sports based story or do they not allow them.

Working on a long editorial and I’m just curious someone else’s opinion on gannett as a whole beyond what I’ve read online.

Messages are open as well if u want to talk in private. Thank you so much.

James