When Just Out‘s arts and culture editor Jaymee Cuti and news editor Jimmy Radosta walked out of the paper last March claiming they had been paid only sporadically for six months, the publisher of Portland’s only LGBT newspaper announced the pair would be easy to replace— Just Out chief Marty Davis said she had 23 resumes sitting on her desk a week after the walk out. But now the replacement editor Davis hired has left is apparently considering leaving the paper, too, after only a few months. This time around, Just Out posted on Craigslist for a new editor.
“This editor will make all assignments and work closely with one part-time staff writer and a host of Portland’s finest free-lance writers,” reads the posting, which says current news/arts editor Amanda Schurr will likely leave the paper due to family illness.
Schurr’s departure certainly isn’t wouldn’t be good news for a paper which has had trouble keeping editors on staff. Despite Just Out‘s citation of family illness as the cause for Schurr’s goodbye, former editors’ complaints about late payment and a hostile work environment will certainly cause some speculation around reasons for her departure.
Update 2:20PM: Davis directed an email requesting comment along to Schurr who replied, “This has not been finalized and no decisions made. I have no other comment at this time.”
Update 3:05PM: Schurr clarified via email that this likely departure is a strictly personal issue, “This is a Plan B. This is a non-issue, a non-event and something still in progress. Marty Davis has lived up to every one of her promises concerning my employment with Just Out and whatever happens has absolutely nothing to do with prior headlines.”
Slow new day Mercury? Let’s see, woman’s mother has cancer. Employer might be impacted if she leaves to care for ailing parent. Hey, let’s trivialize and manipulate this deeply personal situation into something ugly for our own potential gain.
Good job!
Wow.
I’m glad my employer doesn’t discuss specifics of family medical issues on newpaper’s blogs, but then again, my employer also manages to make payroll on a regular basis, so maybe I’m spoiled or something.
Wow, Marty Davis really does come across as a [EDITED: UNNECESSARILY AGGRESSIVE] in print.
Didn’t you hire Matt Davis from a mail-order bride catalog?
No. That was my wife.
And good job successfully trolling the owner of another newspaper Miss Mirk. My hat is off to you.
Yeah, Marty does really come off as a [EDITED: UNNECESSARILY AGGRESSIVE/SEXIST]. I don’t get that’s aggressive about that, much less un-necessarily so. It’s a pretty commonly used word with a pretty commonly understood meaning that has nothing to do with aggression. {FINE, THEN CALL YOUR GRANDMOTHER THAT. BUT KEEP IT OUT OF BLOGTOWN.—EDITOR]
Marty Davis can’t be serious with her comment.
She accuses the Mercury of possibly having a “slow new day”? (whatever that means…) Ooooh wait maybe she meant “slow NEWS day,” but i doubt Just Out in its current form would know what NEWS was even if it splattered all over their faces. Does anyone here open that piece of crap paper? *looks around*
and what employer posts a job advertisement ANYWHERE with details about why the current employee is or could be leaving??
Ms. davis is the last person to be speaking about personal gain and manipulation. she went to court and lost when trying to fight employees over unemployment benefits. she fired an ad rep then begged him to come back and bribed him with an image on the cover (hellooooo drag queen staff member). the place is a cesspool