April 4, 2001

Boston, after some 28 years of court-ordered diversification, has about same precentage of black police officers as black residents; integration results from 1973 consent decree, still in effect, that requires police to select recruits from list that includes one minority candidate for every white one and from department leadership's acceptance of view that such racial balancing aids both social climate and police effectiveness; city has fought challenges to decree brought by white men and pursued administrative steps that could ensure that proportionate number of minority applicants will be hired and promoted should consent decree expire or fall to challenge; photo (M)

Advertising revenue declines and increasing cost of newsprint are squeezing newspaper profits and increasing debate over how answerable to shareholders newspapers should be; Jay T Harris, publisher of San Jose Mercury News, resigned in March rather than endorse newsroom layoffs that he believed were inevitable, given profit margins that his bosses at Knight Ridder had promised Wall Street; layoffs have not materialized but startling move personalized lingering civil war between those who believe industry's goal of high profit margins is killing good journalism and those who believe that strong financial performance will save good journalism; across industry, in large and small markets, newspapers are cutting space, comtemplating buyouts and reducing travel expenses whether or not they have public stockholders; photos (M)

Alfa Group pays $110 million for 44 percent stake in Golden Telecom, which provides telecommunications services in Russia and countries of former Soviet Union, from Britain's Global TeleSystems (S)

US job market remains very tight by historical standards, and labor shortages still plague many professions, including banking, engineering and information technology; unemployed people in some regions, like Midwest, may find their prospects improved by moving to other regions, including Northeast, which has nation's lowest unemployment rate, 3.7 percent; map (M)

Help desks, which provide support when a computer stops working, are plagued by bad relations between Level 1 technicians, who get the calls first, and Level 2 technicians, who handle problems that Level 1's cannot; Level 1's complain of condescension from Level 2's, who earn twice as much; photo (M)