NYT Co. Notifying Authorities of Its Plan to Shut Down Boston Globe

The New York Times Co. said last night that it is notifying federal authorities of its plans to shut down the Boston Globe within weeks, writes Howard Krutz of The washington Post this morning.

The Times Co. said that it will file today a required 60-day notice of the planned shutdown under the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification law after it failed to get the required millions in concessions from union officials that it said it needed to keep the newspaper running.

The move could amount to a negotiating ploy to extract further concessions from the Globe's unions, since the notice does not require the Times Co. to close the paper after 60 days. Talks between the two sides continued early today, wire services reported, after a midnight deadline to forge an agreement came and went. The threat of a shutdown puts the unions under fierce pressure to produce additional savings; the Boston Newspaper Guild promptly called the step a "bullying" tactic by the company.

Some industry observers have expressed skepticism that Times Co. Chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. would want his legacy to include the shuttering of the Globe, which his company bought in 1993.