EW Scripps launched a new round of buyout offers and layoffs on Tuesday as part of a broader strategy to address its large debt load by reducing job-related expenses.
According to several employees familiar with the matter, the layoff notices and buyout offers are affecting nearly every Scripps-owned station across the country, including key markets like Detroit, Cincinnati, Las Vegas, Denver, Phoenix and West Palm Beach.
Layoff notices have been received by some non-union technical workers in the information technology and broadcast engineering departments, according to an informed source. Union-backed journalists, photographers and graphic designers received buyout offers instead of layoff notices because of terms outlined in their collective agreements with the company, two other sources said.
In a memo to employees Tuesday, Scripps CEO Adam Symson said the company has eliminated more than 430 positions across the company, but is also creating 100 new positions in some business units, including local news.
“Our goal is to ensure Scripps remains a strong media company that serves our audiences by adapting to the way they consume news and information,” Symson said.
The layoffs come about a week before Scripps reports its third quarter (Q3) results, and about two weeks after the company offered Symson hand-selected publications for softball interviews about the company’s use of artificial intelligence to advance its local news products.
In his company-wide memo on Tuesday, Symson said he recognized “it can be difficult to see positions cut while we also create new roles”, but said the changes are important for the broadcaster’s future.
“We aim to fill as many of these new roles as possible with colleagues whose positions have been affected,” Symson promised.
Many Scripps-owned news production stations have moved to a new production technique called “Stacker,” in which newsroom managers assemble recorded news segments into a 30- or 60-minute newscast.
In at least one Scripps newsroom, two producers said they were not allowed to use the new Stacker technique because they had been reassigned to writing and developing content for the Scripps website and rolling news feeds. Another producer complained that the Stacker process was “unstable” because it introduced significant errors into the workflow, some of which were visible to viewers during their news broadcasts later in the day.
But Stacker is being pushed into Scripps-owned stations because the company sees it as a way to cut costs, two people said. Many producers fear their jobs could be at risk in the coming weeks and months as more stations evolve their products using this technique. Some producers at stations that adopted the Stacker process received buyout offers Tuesday.
In addition to news production roles, some Scripps-owned stations have also cut positions in engineering and marketing departments, according to people familiar with the matter. The precise number of job cuts at local Scripps stations was unknown, nor was it clear whether company roles were affected.
A Scripps spokesperson has not yet responded to a request for comment on the layoffs and buyout offers.
Scripps made a series of similar layoffs in September as part of a broader restructuring of its local news-producing television stations, which are now overseen by regional general managers who are assigned outlets in 11 different regional territories.
Scripps CEO Adam Symson’s full memo to employees is below:
Colleagues:
Today is another tough day at Scripps. As part of our company-wide transformation, we are eliminating 431 positions across the company, impacting teammates who have contributed to Scripps and served our audiences in meaningful ways. We are deeply grateful for their work and I want to recognize the impact of these decisions on those who are leaving, their colleagues and their teams.
Our goal is to ensure Scripps remains a strong media company that serves our audiences by adapting to the way they consume news and information. As part of today’s announcements, we are also creating more than 100 new positions, including local reporting roles and new community connection roles. These roles are designed to produce more on-the-ground reporting, deepen our community reach and extend our local journalism to audiences across broadcast, streaming and digital platforms. I recognize that it can be difficult to eliminate positions while we are also creating new roles. Both are part of the important changes we are making to position Scripps for the future. We aim to fill as many of these new roles as possible with colleagues whose positions have been affected.
With today’s announcements, the majority of the significant restructuring required to establish our future operating model has now taken place, particularly in our local newsrooms. As we continue our three-year transformation, we expect additional job cuts across the company, but not on the scale of those in 2026. With much of this difficult work behind us, our focus for the year ahead turns to growing the audiences of our local stations and national networks and creating new revenue streams for the company.
In recent Scripps Voice surveys, many of you indicated that you understood the reasons for these changes, and my post last week discussed the early successes of our new strategy. However, today’s news is difficult. Please support each other and treat your departing colleagues with the care and respect they deserve. Leaders have met with affected teams and we will answer questions about what these changes mean for your team and your work as directly and quickly as possible.
Thank you for your continued dedication to our audiences, our communities and to each other.
-Adam Symson
President and CEO
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