More drastic cuts may be coming to the New York Times as part of its newsroom overhaul and increased belt-tightening.
The Gray Lady is weighing ending the print edition of its Sunday magazine, folding the Metro section, making the weekly book review section online-only and leasing out space in its Midtown headquarters, The Post has learned.
Times brass haven’t decided which — if any — of the steps they will take, but with print advertising off 14 percent in the latest quarter, management has some tough decisions to make.
“There’s a target number they need,” said a source close to the situation, who said top managers were looking at a range of options.
One of those options could be deepening payroll reductions, involving as many as 150 jobs in 2017, sources said. Around 80 staffers took a voluntary offer that ended July 17.
“This is nothing more than very badly informed rumor and speculation,” a Times spokeswoman said.
The buyouts came after the Times axed 70 people from its Paris bureau and closed print operations there. With the newsroom on edge at the time, Executive Editor Dean Baquet acknowledged more cost cuts are coming.
“I’ve made clear that the changing economics of journalism make it unlikely we can sustain a newsroom of this size, which is larger than it has ever been,” Baquet said in a May memo to staffers.
Since then, management has been working with outside consultants to come up with more ways to save money, sources said.
With an eye toward improving work flow and streamlining the paper, the bean counters have been monitoring departments and individuals.
Earlier this month, Times Public Editor Liz Spayd analyzed a proposed revamp of Metro from an insider’s perspective. Metro Editor Wendell Jamieson will focus less on chasing police and fire trucks and instead tackle bigger-picture stories to make it more relevant to readers outside the city.
“Jamieson said the Metro revamp is not designed to reduce his staff’s size or save money, though I suspect strategic and financial imperatives across the newsroom could make that inevitable,” Spayd wrote.
It now appears the Times is weighing doing away with the Metro section in the Sunday paper, said one source.
The 164-year-old paper revealed in February that it was rethinking the newsroom as more readers get their news on laptops and phones.
Along with cost-cutting, the company said in April it planned to invest $50 million over the next three years in a bid to double digital ad revenue and chase younger readers.
But the publisher suffered a setback last month when it reported declines in both print and digital ad revenue.
While Chief Executive Mark Thompson said he expected digital ad sales to rebound in the current quarter, he held out no such hope for print ad sales.