Judge to rule soon on Tribune appraisal

A New Jersey judge said Tuesday he would decide in the next 48 hours whether to stop a draft appraisal of the Salt Lake Tribune from becoming public.

In a three-hour hearing in New Jersey Superior Court, Judge Neil H. Shuster heard arguments from former Tribune managers that the valuation by Management Planning Inc. is so fundamentally flawed that it must be thrown out of an ongoing option process.

Shuster said he would issue his ruling before midnight Thursday.

Salt Lake Tribune Publishing Co. (SLTPC) filed the lawsuit in January, challenging Management Planning's appraisal that places the Tribune's worth at $325 million. When averaged with a previous appraisal of $380 million, the valuation sets a final price tag for the newspaper at $352 million.

Former Tribune managers argue the true market value of the paper is closer to their appraised value of $218 million.

Tribune owner MediaNews Group Inc. purchased the paper in December 2000 for $200 million.

SLTPC has asked Shuster to issue the preliminary injunction, while MediaNews has made a motion for a dismissal of the lawsuit altogether.

MediaNews, in court documents, criticized the suit as "a baseless attempt by the plaintiff to escape the jurisdiction of the court in which it first brought suit — and to interrupt an appraisal process over which that court has been exercising oversight."

Another lawsuit over ownership of the Tribune has been working its way through Utah's federal court for the past two years. SLTPC asserted its right to buy the Tribune under a 1997 option agreement, the validity of which has been upheld by U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart.

SLTPC's attempts to exercise the option have been stymied by another Stewart ruling that any Tribune sale cannot take place without the approval of the Deseret News, the Tribune's business partner under a 50-year-old joint operating agreement.

Stewart selected Management Planning in November as the third and final appraiser. SLTPC had previously asked the judge to select the appraiser himself, after it and MediaNews were unable to agree on their own.

MediaNews has also accused SLTPC of bringing the issue to court prematurely, since an agreed-upon comment period has not yet ended. Thus, they said, Management Planning has not had an opportunity to evaluate its alleged mistakes.