The publisher of the The Star-Ledger says the paper is on “life-support” and so making a large-scale buyout offer as it hopes to shed 200 jobs, the paper reported. The buyouts are aimed at non-union staffers. George Arwady, the Newark, NJ-based paper’s publisher, described the use of buyouts as a matter of survival for the paper. He issued a stark ultimatum: if the paper can’t get 200 employees to accept the offer, the paper will be sold. Arwady said that the employees have until Oct. 1 to either agree or reject the buyouts. The news comes amid an incessant string of bad financial news for newspapers, including layoffs this past month at the Atlanta-Journal Constitution, Tribune’s The Orlando Sentinel,  and the Wall St. Journal. On top of that, looking across the past week’s Q2 earnings from Scripps, AH Belo (NYSE: AHC) (NYSE: BLC) and Lee Enterprises (NYSE: LEE), all three posted declines in online revenue.

—AP: The paper’s parent, the Newhouse family’s Advance Publications, also said that it will sell off the Star-Ledger’s sister daily, The Times of Trenton, if staffers there don’t accept 25 individual buyout offers.

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