Even more bad news for the Herald

A few items of interest from the Miami media scene today:

McClatchy Falls to Record Low After Drop in Ad Sales
from Bloomberg News

McClatchy Co. [stock], publisher of the Miami Herald, plunged the most in eight months to a record low after reporting a 19 percent drop in July advertising sales as U.S. newspapers continue to be staggered by the economy.
[...]
McClatchy, which owns 30 daily newspapers, fell 36 cents, or 9 percent, to $3.65 at 2:56 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading, its biggest one-day drop since Dec. 14, when the shares fell 10 percent. A year ago today, the stock traded for more than $22.

Jim Mullin, editor and publisher of Biscayne Times, has just launched a re-designed website for his paper. Mullin, the storied editor of Miami New Times for 18 years, bought the monthly paper in January of 2007. The paper covers neighborhoods along the Biscayne Boulevard corridor from downtown northward.

Things at The MiamiSunPost aren't looking so good. The feisty Miami Beach weekly has fallen on hard times. My sources say they are bouncing checks and in some cases have stopped paying contributors and freelancers.

A former SunPost insider tells me that the paper is no doubt feeling the effects of the real estate advertising downturn that's affecting all newspapers but adds that the paper has been on a slide since publisher Andrew Stark left last year. Stark had been at the helm of the paper since 1995.

Long-time editor Erik Bojnansky left the paper in February and managing editor Rachael Lee Coleman's name recently disappeared from the masthead.