Pittsburgh City Paper is ending its free weekly print edition, at least for now, City Paper executive editor Ali Trachta confirmed in a phone call Tuesday night.
“We’re not going anywhere,” she said, emphasizing that the outlet will continue to produce original content and reporting on its website.
In an editor’s letter appearing in the final, Oct. 15 edition of the alt-weekly, Trachta announced that, “instead of a weekly digest, City Paper will now bring you four super-issues per year, starting this December.”
“Contained within will be your favorite greatest hits, including our People of the Year feature, election guide, and of course, the pièce de City Paper resistance: our annual Best of PGH issue,” she wrote.
Trachta confirmed to Pittsburgh Independent that five employees were laid off from City Paper Tuesday–two in production, two in sales, and another in marketing. She said those positions were primarily connected to the weekly print edition.
The editor’s letter does not mention the layoffs but does declare that the alt-weekly, like other newspapers, has been “battling hard times,” including “rising costs and less revenue, but also, misinformation, hostility towards media, a rough economy, and loss of talent to more stable industries.”
Pittsburgh City Paper was acquired in January 2023 by Cars Holding Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Block Communications Inc. of Toledo, Ohio. Block Communications also owns the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, itself the subject of an ongoing, nearly three-year journalists’ strike, the longest active strike in the United States.
“We believe in the need for independent journalism and are happy to further our commitment to the city of Pittsburgh and, specifically, to support this well-established entertainment and alternative news publication,” Allan Block, chairman and CEO of Block Communications, said in the press release announcing City Paper’s purchase.
