Newspapers always push for more transparency. It stands to reason that well-informed people generally make better decisions. This editorial has often advocated for more openness from many of the University's administrators and student governing organizations.
Though The Cavalier Daily is an independent organization not connected with the University's finances, we think that as a member of the University community, it is important to be as open and honest as possible about our financial decision-making. Our objective is to clearly communicate our plans and the impetus behind them. Our goal is to assure readers that we remain fervently dedicated to our journalistic product and to guarantee its long-term success.
Some readers may have noticed that no hard-copy versions of The Cavalier Daily were available this past Friday. To control costs in light of tough economic times, the Managing Board has implemented a plan that will remove five Friday papers from the publication schedule this academic year. We are choosing the exact dates based on advertising projections; we will remove the least financially viable issues. Friday editions experience lower readership than the rest of the week and historically speaking, see less advertisements as a result.
The Cavalier Daily is chartered as a private, non-profit entity. To preserve our autonomy, no funding is channeled to the newspaper from the University administration or any of its auxiliary bodies. This in turn protects our journalistic integrity - it is impossible to report fairly and without bias if we are financially beholden to those we cover. Many other independent college papers are able to draw upon private endowments to finance their operations. Though we maintain an investment pool, all of our income is generated from advertising revenue. During downward cycles in the economy, companies looking to scale back expenses often reduce their marketing budgets substantially. As a result, publications like our own must respond to market cues and adjust accordingly.
The decision to cut five papers was an extraordinarily difficult one to make, and it came about only after overhead and ancillary costs were reduced as much as possible. Scaling back on our core product is certainly a last resort, but the changes made are relatively small, all things considered. At most, only five papers of the 136 planned for this academic year should be cut. Furthermore, The Cavalier Daily online edition will continue to offer news and sports coverage on those Fridays without a hard-copy paper. We also hope to feature more multimedia content on these days as well.
It should be further emphasized that this measure is temporary and consistent with a "big picture" perspective on the organization. In recent weeks, our budget outlook has been more encouraging. If advertising revenue continues to recover at its current rate, newspapers that were projected to be cut may be put back into the production schedule. We have taken the cautious route in this situation, preparing the business for a worse scenario than we expect will actually occur.
The underlying goal of this plan is to preserve The Cavalier Daily's fiscal health for future staffs. In past years, revenue projections were based primarily on recent historical data, so budgets and cost allocations remained fairly consistent on a year-to-year basis. After the recession hit, of course, those numbers changed. We wish to allow future editors the ability to focus primarily on strengthening the paper's content, not managing a hard-pressed budget. We hope this approach will keep this year's core product intact yet still alleviate the financial strain placed upon future Managing Boards.
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