And a total of 1,400 cut for McClatchy. Ouch!

The parent company of The News & Observer will cut 10 percent of its total work force, or the equivalent of 1,400 full-time workers, to deal with falling advertising revenue. Sacramento, Calif.-based McClatchy Co. (NYSE: MNI) said the cuts will come from both voluntary and involuntary layoffs as well as the elimination of unfilled positions. “We have been transitioning steadily and successfully from a traditional newspaper company to an integrated multimedia company for some time,” McClatchy CEO Gary Pruitt said in a statement. “The effects of the current national economic downturn — particularly in real estate, auto and employment advertising – make it essential that we move faster now to realign our workforce and make our operations more efficient. I’m sorry this requires the painful announcement we are making today, but we’re taking this action to help ensure a healthy future for our company.”

And it’s not just the big media companies. The Philadelphia Inquirer, now an independently and locally owned newspaper, is having trouble meeting its debt obligations. This scoop originally came from my old pals at the Bulletin:

Philadelphia – The owner of The Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News has missed a June 1 interest payment on $85 million of loans and is in talks with lenders for relief, according to a report released Thursday by a debt ratings agency.
Philadelphia Media Holdings LLC did not maintain the necessary senior debt-to-cash flow ratio – which can happen when cash flow shrinks – required by its senior lenders, according to Standard and Poor’s Leveraged Commentary and Data unit.
As a result, senior lenders blocked the company’s interest payments to $85 million in junior loans held by another group of lenders. That’s because senior lenders, who hold at least $295 million in loans, want to preserve the company’s cash for repayment of its own loans.

But as one wise observer points out, the real lead is this sentence:

Philadelphia Media Holdings is also seeking an equity infusion of about $8 million.

When a half-billion dollar business has to go begging for $8 million, something is seriously wrong.