New York Times Will Offer Employee Buyouts and Eliminate Public Editor Role

The New York Times offered buyouts to its newsroom employees on Wednesday, aiming to reduce layers of editing and requiring more of the editors who remain.

In a memo to the newsroom, Dean Baquet, the executive editor, and Joseph Kahn, the managing editor, said the current system of copy editors and “backfielders” who assign and shape articles would be replaced with a single group of editors who would be responsible for all aspects of an article. Another editor would be “looking over their shoulders before publication.”

“Our goal is to significantly shift the balance of editors to reporters at The Times, giving us more on-the-ground journalists developing original work than ever before,” they said in the memo.

In a separate memo, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the publisher, said the company would be eliminating the position of public editor, which was established to receive reader complaints and question Times journalists on how they make decisions. Liz Spayd, the current public editor, will leave The Times on Friday.

The buyouts are meant primarily for editors, but reporters and others in the newsroom will also be able to apply for them, the memo said. Mr. Baquet and Mr. Kahn said that the savings generated by the reduction in editing layers would be used to hire as many as 100 more journalists.

The Times would turn to layoffs if not enough people volunteer for buyouts, Mr. Baquet and Mr. Kahn said in the memo.