Tribune merges Hartford paper, TV stations

Tribune Co., the newspaper publisher and television station owner operating under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, said Monday that it has combined a newspaper and two TV operations in Hartford, Connecticut in a bid to become more efficient and cut costs. The move puts the operations of The Hartford Courant and WTIC-TV and WTXX-TV in Hartford under one roof, an unusual pairing, and places a TV executive in charge of both. The company said Monday that Richard Graziano, the general manager of the two TV stations, will become the publisher of Courant. He replaces Steve Carver who has been publisher of the Pulitzer Prize-winning paper since November 2006. The Courant is the nation's oldest continuously published newspaper with a weekday circulation of about 165,000 and Sundays at 235,000. The TV stations, the only two local stations in Hartford, will broadcast news from a new studio to be constructed in the paper's newsroom.