HONOLULU (AP) — Canadian publisher David Black is going through with the purchase of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, made possible after he reached agreement with unionized newsroom employees.
The Nov. 9 deal to purchase the newspaper was contingent on a labor agreement with the Star-Bulletin's 90 unionized newsroom employees. They ratified a five-year contract Tuesday.
A deadline for Black to back out of the agreement passed Thursday.
"We're going full speed ahead," said Black, who owns Black Press Ltd, a Victoria, British Columbia, company that publishes 80 newspapers in western Canada and Washington state.
Liberty Newspapers LP agreed to sell the Star-Bulletin to settle a federal antitrust lawsuit by the state and a citizens group over plans to close the 118-year-old newspaper.