The Honolulu Advertiser is laying off 54 people, nearly one-tenth of the staff at the state's largest daily newspaper.

The cuts come from several departments and affect everyone from junior employees to at least one with service of decades at the paper.
The news came as a shock to those in the news business.

As reporter Mike Gordon describes it: "We got an e-mail in the morning from the publisher."

It was an e-mail that 54 staff would have to go.

"I didn't really appreciate the way they did it,” Gordon said. “I would have thought that would have been something handled a little nicer, not that there's really a nice way to do it."

Photographer Joaquin Siopack was terminated over the phone – on his day off.

"He told me that they have to lay off 54 people and I'm on the list and Aug. 10th will be my last day of work," Siopack said. “This hurts. This hurts very deeply."

Dick Adair, a Honolulu Advertiser cartoonist for decades, is also on the newsroom cut list -- a move that puzzles the union.

"The contract says they've got to lay off by seniority," said Wayne Cahill, spokesperson for The Hawaii Newspaper Guild. “More than 2 decades -- that's a long, long time to be a junior person."

A total of four news staff were listed -- the rest spread among many departments, including press operators and advertising.

"There aren't any winners in this,” Gordon said. “I didn't get the axe today, but there are 54 people who have to go home to their families, whether they're married or their kids, and tell them that they don't have a job tomorrow."

It comes amid drawn-out negotiations over expired union contracts.

"We met with the companies recently, as late as yesterday afternoon, in a conversation we thought was rather productive, and the company didn't breathe a word of this," Cahill said.

Publisher Lee Webber said in a statement: "We do not take this action lightly, but we are not immune to the national trends affecting the news paper industry, nor from the downturn in our local economy."

The move came on the same day paper owner Gannett announced a 36 percent hit to profits. A corporate spokesperson told KHON2 no other Gannett papers announced layoffs in response and that the Honolulu Advertiser made a local decision.

"As our national and local economies recover, we'll start to grow once again," Webber said.

Cahill said the layoffs could move the unions further in the direction of a strike. A union meeting is underway this evening.

"Where they're getting rid of people are the people who are creating what people are reading,” Siopack said, “and they're starting to wonder, why aren't we getting more customers?"