If you want to start the week off on a good note, don’t read this forecast of all the newspapers, magazines and, yes, websites that are likely to close this year.

The Toronto Globe and Mail may be about to join the layoff log. The newspaper is looking to reduce its workforce by about 10 percent, or between 80 and 90 jobs, according to a brief statement on its website. There haven’t been layoffs at the Globe and Mail since 1982, and even then all the people were rehired under the terms of a union contract. Publisher Philip Crawley cited an anticipated $40 million drop in advertising this revenue as unprecedented. “The pace and the severity of the decline is like nothing we’ve seen in recent years,” he said. The buyout offer is generous: three weeks of salary, up to a maximum of 18 months’ pay, for each year of continuous service. The Globe and Mail operates under a tighter set of union restrictions than most North American newspapers. The Financial Post says the union contract forbids the paper from cutting staff without opening its books for examination.

The Evening Sun of Hanover County, Pa. will cut nine reporter and editor positions from its 25-person newsroom. “Hopefully, readers won’t notice any decline in coverage,” as a result of the loss of 36% of the staff, the editor-in-chief said. However, copy editing is badly needed, as demonstrated by this quote from the Evening Sun‘s publisher: “There is no intention to ever not have a newspaper in this community.”

A reader reports that the Selma (Calif.) Enterprise and nearby Kingsburg Recorder have moved their printing operations 25 miles away to the Hanford Sentinel.  Between seven and 12 people have been laid off, the reader said. However, this report is unconfirmed.

Struggling to meet a goal to reduce expenses by $50 million in 2009, Chicago’s Sun-Times Media Group has asked all its unionized employees to agree to a 7% cut in compensation. The cuts can come from salary, benefits or a combination of the two. The union said it’ll think about it. The Chicago Sun-Times has also put forth a proposal to outsource copy editing to an unspecified contractor, possibly in India or Canada. The union definitely didn’t like that idea. And the paper has laid off an unspecified number of people in its advertising group.

The Newman (Ga.) Times-Herald has reduced its staff by 10 people, or 15%, but expects to be around for at least another 144 years, according to a gung-ho editorial bylined by both its president and publisher.

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