Kurt Greenbaum is Online News Director for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. He can be reached at kgreenbaum@post-dispatch.com.

Now that the public can point out errors within minutes, can the modern newsroom afford to shed a layer of editors?

IN THE FRENZY FOLLOWING a fatal shooting in the Kirkwood, Mo., city council on Feb. 7, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Web site briefly confused the name of killed officer Tom Ballman with the name of another nearby St. Louis suburb: Ballwin.

Within minutes, three readers noted the mistake. “They were very observant, very quick to point it out,” said Amanda St. Amand, continuous news editor. “And we were happy to fix it.”

For some journalists, that's evidence that newsrooms are either too fast to post news online or too slow to put editors between reporters and the Web. For others, it illustrates a strength Web sites have over the printed newspaper: Readers can get involved in shaping — even editing — the news in almost real time.

In fact, in a tough newsroom economy, the question that seems to be asked more frequently is: Can we afford the layers of editing that traditionally filter our newspaper stories?

The answer, as Jeff Jarvis sees it, it simple: No, we can't. In fact, Jarvis goes to a place some say is extreme: We should not only cut editing layers, but we should invite readers to help step in.

“The task of editing online is no longer about managing a scarcity of space but instead is about making the best use of resources, finding new external resources and improving quality,” says Jarvis, a columnist, BuzzMachine.com blogger and City University of New York journalism professor.

And don't just involve readers; tell them about it upfront. “I'm saying that we need a new attitude of collaboration,” Jarvis said. “The public will help us correct errors we didn't see and help us make stories more complete.”

Trade publications and business journals have chronicled the efforts by some newsrooms to outsource copy editing to India, flatten organizations or chop positions. A handful of newspapers recently eliminated the managing editor position.

At the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, the “flattening” started near the top, when managing editor Sharon Rosenhause retired and editor Earl Maucker decided to cut the post entirely. Not only that, but Maucker said department heads are being reduced and reorganized in the newsroom.

Why the reduction? The reason, plain and simple, is money. Maucker said budget issues required the changes.

With tightening news hole and required cuts, he decided the newsroom could do without a managing editor and could trim department heads. “We don't have the content or the content preparation we once had,” Maucker said. All Maucker's changes are relatively new, so he can't evaluate how well they will work. Economic reality compels him to try it — and he concedes newspapers have built a bureaucratic process into the editing ranks over the years.

His worries: Some of the biggest disasters in journalism occurred when the editing process was subverted or circumvented. Maucker cited the Chiquita case at the Cincinnati Enquirer in 1999 — though not an issue of word editing — as proof. Editors and reporters failed to follow the procedures spelled out in the editing process at the Enquirer, with vast legal consequences. In his own newsroom, he says he has fewer copy editors on the job — and the number of errors per page is up.

The bureaucratic process that Maucker references is a holdover from old-style newsroom workflow. Line editors coach writers and assign stories. They advocate for the stories and their reporters in news meetings, where stories are pitched for prime play. By the time the story makes it to the copy desk, line editors are no longer objective about the story.

John McIntyre, assistant managing editor for the copy desk at another Tribune newspaper, the Baltimore Sun, said he would look at other ways to reorganize the editing process. “People who write will take every last minute that they are allowed to,” MyIntyre said. One way to correct that is to impose a fairly strict deadline structure, he said.

McIntyre knows the industry is changing and staffing must change with it. But he also advocates for the craft of copy editing — one that looks vulnerable as some organizations have outsourced or eliminated the jobs.

McIntyre argues the copy-editing process exists to bring fresh eyes to a story before it goes in print — a medium he says readers expect to be “vetted, verified and gone over.” “The line editor is intimately involved with the reporter,” McIntyre said. “He has all that context in his head. The important thing is to have a copy desk that is independent.”

On the other hand, Maucker said, “critics would argue that you get too many fingers in the process and it becomes enormously labor intensive. I don't know if there's a right answer or a wrong answer.” He acknowledges that the status quo won't work — especially when his own newsroom lost 52 positions in July through voluntary and involuntary layoffs.

Meanwhile, Maucker also applauds the newsy feel and the immediacy he often finds in the Sun-Sentinel's many blogs. Sure, he's troubled by errors that pop up and subjective reporting, but he finds the writing to be brighter and more entertaining.

So, what's it all mean for the future of newsrooms (and editors)?

• Numerous layers of editors can't continue, and change will occur
• Invite the newsroom to help redesign the workflow. Jarvis suggests this exercise: Pretend the presses will be sold, and the operation is online only. Does it change the process? If staffers are involved with the workflow redesign, they won't be surprised by changes.
• Develop an editing structure that eliminates the artificial divide between line editors and copy editors. Make every editor the readers' advocate.
• Find a way to invite readers to be partners in our work. We can't deliver perfection; we never could. If readers know we're listening, they'll talk to us.
• Really rethink newsroom organization, paying particular attention to deadlines.

Every story doesn't need to arrive on the final print deadline. That old-style workflow forces redundancy. Online should be primary, especially for breaking news. There's a deadline every minute.

“We're changing, and we have to be thoughtful about that,” Maucker said. “Doing it under economic crisis isn't the most thoughtful way to go, but it's forcing us to make decisions we should have made a long time ago.” *