Keep up with The Times: Big changes coming today

I love a parade.

So I was tickled to be actually walking in one, the Macy's Holiday Parade in downtown Seattle, on the morning after Thanksgiving. But as six Seattle Times columnists and I strapped on newspaper-delivery bags filled with candy canes for kids, I also was anxious about the reception we might get as we marched behind a Times banner.

Bashing the "mainstream media" has become a national sport, and I knew we could be the target of verbal barbs, leftover turkey legs, or worse. Would the day-old pumpkin pie be pushed into my face by a Republican furious that our editorial page had endorsed Obama for president, or a Democrat livid that that page had supported Rossi for governor? (As executive editor over our news operation, by the way, I had nothing to do with either.)

So it was to my surprise and relief that as we paraded down Fourth Avenue, we were cheered and applauded. In my favorite moment, a man yelled out, "Please stay in business!"

We're working on it, sir. We are working on it.

You might have heard that the country's having a few money problems. While the pain is widespread, some industries are feeling it more acutely than others, and few have been as devastated as the newspaper business.

In the case of The Seattle Times, the fundamental problem is not a loss of readers. Although we've experienced modest decline in the past year, circulation remains relatively healthy and our combined print-online readership is as strong as it's ever been. But newspapers across America have seen a profound drop in our main source of income: advertising, and especially in the classified "want ads" for cars, jobs and houses.

In Seattle, that squeeze is exacerbated by the anachronistic partnership known as the Joint Operating Agreement, in which the locally owned Seattle Times Co. prints, delivers and sells advertising for the Hearst-owned Post-Intelligencer. In an era when most cities can barely support one newspaper, let alone two, the result is millions of dollars in red ink for both companies.

Even after several years of budget-cutting, our revenues don't match our expenses. So we've pulled out the blades to slash more, in every department — including the newsroom.

My primary responsibility as editor is to make sure that as we do so, we protect the core journalistic functions that are most important to our civic role, and to our relationship with you.

Which brings us to this: Monday, you'll see some major changes in The Times.

Most significantly, the daily paper will now be presented in three sections (down from four) on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday.

The first section, which includes the top local, national, international and business news, will be largely unchanged, save for the addition of the Opinion page. Likewise for the third section, Sports.

But the sections known as NWLife and Local News are no more. In their place tomorrow you'll find a new second section called "NWMonday" (and so on through the week), which combines the most essential elements of both.

Though this new section was born of necessity, we're pleased with how it's turned out. We're confident that after a jolt of change, you'll come to like it, too.

On the cover, you'll find news and analysis from across the region, your favorite local columnists, and unique feature articles about the people and institutions that make this one of the world's remarkable places. Inside, you'll find news updates, coverage of government, public safety, education, environment and other local issues. You'll find obituaries, which uniquely connect the community and provide a sort of ongoing historical record of its people. On the back page, you'll find the weather map and data.

You'll also find comics, puzzles and entertainment news in the new section. And you'll find a dynamic new page — tomorrow, it's "Your Monday" — that will help guide you through your day. It will help you plan activities through expert previews of concerts, theater, readings, movies, lectures and other community events. It will serve your culinary cravings through excerpts from Nancy Leson's "All You Can Eat" blog from seattletimes.com. And it will help you make the most of your time at home, through recommendations for television programming, DVDs, books and recipes.

Additionally, on Thursdays, we'll continue to provide the NWWeekend section, focusing on travel, outdoor and family activities around our region. And on Fridays, we'll give you NWTicket, the area's best guide to music, theater, restaurants, movies and other entertainment choices.

What you will no longer find in the daily paper are some features I know many of you will miss: the Bridge column, the Scrabble game, The New York Times crossword puzzle and the daily television listings. We'll give you TV listings in our Sunday "TV Times" magazine, and those listings and The New York Times crossword will be available on our Web site. We'll keep our long-running Daily Crossword in the daily and Sunday newspapers, and the NYT crossword on Sunday.

If this were the popular HBO series "The Wire," this is where the newspaper editor would say, "Less is more," and that we're making the paper smaller to save you time in your busy lives.

But I'm in the truth-telling business. We are making these changes because we are reducing our two largest newsroom expenses: staff and newsprint.

Less is less, and we won't be offering you quite as much content. That said, we're committed to sustaining the high quality of what we publish. And we're confident we will give you a newspaper well worth every hard-earned penny you spend on it, each and every day.

Even after a series of staff reductions, The Times employs the largest and best newsgathering staff in the state of Washington — people who are your neighbors and who care deeply about this community.

Week after week, even in these tough times, we bring you journalism you won't find anywhere else:

• Authoritative beat reporting on a range of subjects — from Boeing to baseball, cinema to science, the University of Washington to universal health care.

• Nationally heralded investigative reporting, such as the "Culture of Resistance" investigation on the shocking rise in MRSA infections in local hospitals, and the ongoing "Favor Factory" series on the misuse of congressional earmarks — recently cited by the National Press Foundation as the nation's best coverage of Congress over the past year.

• Award-winning photography that captures the riveting visual images of our corner of the country.

• Columnists such as Danny Westneat, Nicole Brodeur, Jerry Large, Steve Kelley and Jerry Brewer — people who share your passion for the place we live, but who are not afraid to provoke you to make their point.

• Useful information — both in news and advertising — that will help you save money in these challenging times.

Just as your families are tightening your belts, we are tightening ours. We'll get through this recession together.

And when it's over — when the economy has bounced back and the news industry has succeeded in building a new, viable business model — let's have a parade.