New Tribune owner shakes up the NAC

Sale of the Salt Lake Tribune - Read Deseret News archive stories and see related links about the sale of the Tribune.

W. Dean Singleton, whose Denver-based MediaNews is the new owner of the Salt Lake Tribune, returned Wednesday to Salt Lake City, and this time received a decidedly different welcome at 143 S. Main than he did last month when he first was prevented from inspecting the premises of the newspaper he was in the process of buying from AT&T Broadband for $200 million.

"This time they let me in the door," quipped Singleton in an interview with the Deseret News.

Singleton on Wednesday afternoon visited his latest newspaper acquisition and its staff, who will join 11,000 other MediaNews employees throughout the group's chain.

His visit followed a meeting Tuesday of the new board of directors of the Newspaper Agency Corp., where Dominic Welch, publisher of the Tribune, was removed as president. Welch was also removed as a member of the NAC board, as was Randy Frisch, chief operating officer of Tribune Publishing.

NAC, of which the Deseret News and Tribune each own 50 percent, handles the advertising, printing and circulation of the Deseret News and Tribune in a joint operating agreement that has been in place since 1952. In recent years, the Tribune publisher has always operated as president and manager of NAC.

Under the agreement entered into Tuesday, the new NAC board members are Singleton, MediaNews Chief Financial Officer Jody Lodovic, Deseret News chairman L. Glen Snarr and Deseret News Publisher Jim Wall, with Singleton elected chairman and Snarr elected vice chairman.

"The Newspaper Agency Corp. will be operated fairly and efficiently for the maximum benefit of advertisers, subscribers and the community. The two papers will be operated completely separately," Singleton said.

In addition, Joseph Zerbey, president of the York Newspaper Co., a JOA between the York Daily Record and the York Dispatch, York, Pa. (the latter newspaper owned by MediaNews), will move to Salt Lake City to become NAC president, the position formerly held by Welch.

Frederick Anderson was elected treasurer and chief financial officer of NAC, and Patricia Robinson was elected secretary.

During his visit to the Tribune Wednesday, Singleton said the management and staff "couldn't have been nicer" to him this time around.