Vancouver Newspaper Emerges from Bankruptcy

The Columbian, a Vancouver-based newspaper, had its bankruptcy reorganization plan approved Friday after 9 months of negotiations with its creditors under Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Part of the agreement with the creditors involved the transfer of ownership of its 6 storey building to one of its largest creditor, Bank of America. The Bank was the last major creditor to give its approval to the reorganization plans. This comes two years after insurmountable debts, shrinking revenue and high staff turnover for the 120 year old newspaper.

The Columbian has been owned by the Campbell family through their flagship company, Downtown Vitality Partners since 1921. It was only in January 2008 that they had moved the newspaper operations into its new steel-structured building at 415 W. Sixth St, due to space requirements and operational expansion. But that same month, the economy started to shrink and with it plummeted the newspaper industry. The very next month saw the first of what would be three rounds of lay-offs among workers until by the end of that year, the newspaper had laid off 100 out of 360 staff workers.

Coupled with the loss of many good workers was a dwindling subscriber base. This prompted the company to move its operations out of its new 130,000 square foot steel building and back to its old single storey headquarters at 701 W. Eight St. Its steel-structured building on Sixth St was put up for sale for $14.5 million although it was initially valued at $30 million. Until today, the building is still on the market.

The city of Vancouver has expressed its interest in buying the building. At present, the city’s administrative departments are housed in separate buildings all over the city and many of them in leased properties. But any purchase of the building would require a thorough evaluation by the finance department of the city authorities as they themselves are experiencing a $6 million shortfall in revenue this year. NAI Norris, Beggs and Simpson is the agency handling the sale of the building.

Despite the uncertainty of whether the sale of the building will materialize, the Campbell family believes the prospects of the Columbian are bright. The number of staff workers has stood at 237 since last year with 55 of these being newsroom staff. Subscriptions have also stabilized since falling by 18% since 2007. Daily readership stands at about 35,000 except on Sundays when the readership usually reaches 40,000. Advertisement revenue has returned and is on the increase, which is more good news.

All in all, it appears that the Columbian is back in business.