D-Day for 'Washington Post' Buyout Offers?

Newsweek isn't the only part of The Washington Post Co. shedding staff. The Post itself has been promising buyout offers for several weeks now, and, according to a source at the company, the actual packets are expected to go out today.

The paper's human resources head, Ann McDaniel, was in a meeting when I called, but Post media columnist Howard Kurtz says he hasn't yet received a packet, even though, as a full-timer over 50 with more than five years at the paper under his belt, he'll be eligible, according to terms announced last month. "I haven't been paying much attention because I'm not taking it," he adds.

That could put him in the minority if things shake out at the Post at all like they did at Newsweek, where 111 of the 146 eligible employees said yes. The Post Co. source calls the stampede for the newsweekly's exits "really depressing."

One Postie who has so far pointedly declined to rule out the buyout possibility is executive editor Leonard Downie Jr. Asked about talk that he'll be stepping down imminently, the 65-year-old Downie merely told the Washington City Paper, "The newsroom's full of all kinds of rumors."