Rumors flew this past week when clients who used the Santa Barbara News-Press’s big press in Goleta to print their jobs were told that it was out of commission. Some said they’d heard it might be permanent.
The paper itself ran front-page stories on Tuesday and Wednesday explaining the plant was having power issues, said Dave Mason, managing editor for the paper. The suspension of the press was temporary, and the paper was going to an online version daily in the meantime.
A printing press is a behemoth of a machine that uses tremendous amounts of power — as much as 480 volts at 800 amps, said one operator of a press in California. It’s unknown if the rumble of the press shook the power supply apart or if it’s the power supplied to the building that’s affected, but ever since “The News-Press Mess” started an outflow of personnel in 2006, any change at the paper has caused rumors to circulate.
Most recently, the paper’s staff joined the printing press at its Goleta location on South Kellogg Avenue in April, leaving the iconic building on De la Guerra Plaza in Santa Barbara that the newspaper had occupied since 1922. In October 2022, the News-Press ended home deliveries of its paper by carrier service and switched to same-day mail service, citing “labor shortages, higher gas prices, and other current economic challenges.”