BUFFALO, N.Y. — In less than 48 hours, the route from the press to your front door will cross state lines.
The Buffalo News is set to print its final edition at the corner of Scott and Washington on Saturday.
It follows an announcement from the paper’s owner Lee Enterprise in February that it’s taking printing operations to Cleveland in a move ownership says is aimed at maintaining its current operations and level of reporters.
However, the move also comes at the expense of roughly 160 production employees who will be out of a job by the end of the day on Saturday.
John Fletch, the president of Buffalo Local Mailer Union #81, CWA 14169 an employee of almost four decades, is one of them.
"The fact that this is more so outsourcing rather than a shutdown, how it's affecting all these local employees, as well as the community and the loyal supporters of our product, that's where it hits hard,” Fletch said.
The paper’s writers’ union stood in solidarity with its colleagues. In a statement to 2 On Your Side Thursday, it called the move “devastating” and added that “Western New York deserves more from Lee Enterprises.”
“Their deadlines are even shorter now, and the news will be even older now,” Fletch said.
Those changes leave the city’s oldest paper to grapple with its uncertain future — and Fletch and his colleagues, for the first time in their careers, looking for a new assignment.
“I was brought in for holiday help, and here we sit talking 38 years later,” Fletch said. “I feel confident that I'm going to realize there's life outside the Buffalo News.”
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