A sweeping round of layoffs at CBS parent company Paramount Global has impacted around a half-dozen employees at an independent television station in Seattle, The Desk has learned.
The job cuts at KSTW (Channel 11) were part of a broader restructuring of Paramount’s workforce that saw around 800 employees let go across the company’s local, national and digital media operations.
Five employees were among those laid off at KSTW, including the station’s chief engineer and a four-person creative services department, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
Going forward, KSTW’s creative services output — including station and programming promos and social media marketing — will be performed by CBS-owned sister station KPIX (Channel 5) in San Francisco, according to one source. KPIX also produced a localized newscast for KSTW until last August.
KSTW previously served as the Seattle area’s CW Network station until last year, when Paramount converted it and seven other stations into full-time independent operations. Paramount retained a minority interest in the CW Network after it and Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) sold a controlling 75 percent stake in the network to Nexstar Media Group in 2022.
On Tuesday, Paramount CEO Bob Bakish said the company needed to reduce its global workforce by 3 percent in order to reign in certain operational costs. Journalists at CBS News and sales executives at BET Media were among the hundreds of workers to receive pink slips.
