Word: allbritton
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...Federal Communications Commission will make a long-awaited ruling that could turn Washington, D.C., into a one-newspaper town. The agency is expected to decide whether or not Texas Multimillionaire Joe L. Allbritton, who bought a controlling interest in the stuffy, money-losing Washington Star (circ. 370,000) last fall, can also acquire the parent company's six moneymaking radio and television stations as well. The FCC has a rule against perpetuating such local monopolies when ownership changes hands, but Allbritton has pleaded for a waiver, saying that he needs profits from the stations to keep the paper alive...
...ownership rule, but the Star is, to put it mildly, a special case. For one thing, the paper is the capital's only alternative to the fat, influential and steadfastly liberal Washington Post (circ. 536,000). For another, the Star is in the middle of a remarkable transformation. Allbritton, 50, took over the paper last September with a $5 million payment to descendants of the Adams, Kauffmann and Noyes families that have owned it since 1867, plus a $5 million loan to the paper. He brought in James Bellows, 52, the highly regarded former editor...
Texas-Size Losses. Successful is one thing the Star is not. The paper lost $15 million in the four years before Allbritton arrived. It is expected to lose another $8 to $10 million this year, despite an unprecedented agreement last fall by 540 employees to work a four-day week-at a 20% cut in pay-rather than face layoffs. Daily circulation has dropped 3% since Allbritton took over, and recession-hit 1975 advertising revenues are down 11% from last year. According to the purchase agreement, Allbritton can pull out of the deal at any time and get back...
...peppery 49, Allbritton is a Texas Democrat who has no love for Turncoat Republican John Connally, and was a major backer of the presidential ambitions of Senator Edmund Muskie-partly, friends say, because he has a hankering to swing some weight in big-time politics. Apparently with that ambition in mind, he tried to buy the archconservative Houston Chronicle in 1972, but was turned down because the owners considered him too liberal...
...Allbritton is known to be casting around for someone to succeed Newbold Noyes, 55, the Star-News' editor since 1963. Bill Moyers, former L.B.J. press secretary and a onetime publisher of Long Island's Newsday, is one of several possibilities. As for politics, Allbritton says only that his paper will be "objective and fair." Yet a me-too editorial stance would hardly help the Star-News gain much ground against the liberal Post; its best strategy may be to present itself as a strong conservative alternative. One thing seems certain: Allbritton plans a vigorous personal role...