MEDIA

San Francisco’s Two Major Dailies May Soon Merge: A plan to combine the San Francisco Chronicle and the San Francisco Examiner, long a subject of speculation, is “essentially done” and could be completed within a week, the San Jose Mercury News reported Saturday. The plan calls for Hearst Corp. to close its evening Examiner in exchange for a minority interest and editorial control of the morning Chronicle, an anonymous source told the San Jose paper. The two papers have been publishing under a joint operating agreement due to expire in 2005. They share business operations but have separate news and editorial staffs. Hearst has been pursuing the Chronicle for the last few years. A merger would probably cost several hundred jobs, union executives said.