(UPDATE: Sportswriter Dave Scheiber is the latest staffer to see his job eliminated, announced Oct. 12)

The St. Petersburg Times has seen several staff members depart and has begun charging for access to its archived stories as cost-cutting continues at the newspaper.

Award-winning Miami-based correspondent David Adams left the newspaper last week, topping a list that includes reporter Saundra Amrhein, graphic artist Rossie Newson, photojournalist Sherman Zent, reporter Eileen Schulte and editorial assistant Sandee Davies. 

These departures have come following the announcement of a companywide 5 percent pay cut beginning in November and statements from Times executives acknowledging that the company would get smaller in response to challenging economic times.

The newspaper has also begun charging  for access to story archives through its Web site, a service that was previously provided free of charge (other newspapers have charged for access to stories in their archives for years). Users can still search the newspaper's archives back to 1987 and see abstracts that summarize the content of articles.

But to access the full text of stories there, users must now pay fees ranging from $3.95 per story to $199.95 for a yearlong pass to the archive. The charges do not apply to the Google News Archives, which hold copies of Times content back to 1901, or stories outside the archive which may turn up in a Web search using sites such as Google or Yahoo.

See an FAQ explaining some of the archive changes by clicking here. See a list of all the rates by clicking here.

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