SAN ANTONIO – Media and entertainment company Clear Channel Communications Inc. has slashed its work force by 9 percent, eliminating 1,850 jobs in the company’s corporate, radio and outdoor advertising divisions.

“We are facing an unprecedented time of distress in the general economy, and the ripple effects have hit some of our largest customers hard,” CEO Mark Mays wrote in a memo announcing the cuts, according to Bloomberg News. The message was e-mailed to Clear Channel employees yesterday afternoon; company spokeswoman Michele Clarke confirmed the memo but declined further comment.

Mays attributed the layoffs in part to a realignment of Clear Channel’s ad department as the company responds to the ongoing economic slump. They come half a year after the company – now a subsidiary of San Antonio-based CC Media Holdings Inc. (OTCBB: CCMO) – was acquired by private-equity firms Bain Capital Partners LLC and Thomas H. Lee Partners LP in a deal valued at $17.9 billion. (READ MORE)

Clear Channel is the nation’s largest radio broadcaster, with more than 2,000 stations, including the local 94 WHJY-FM, 920 WHJJ-AM, 93.3 WSNE “Coast FM” and “B101” WWBB-FM. But like many broadcasters, it has seen its earnings suffer in recent months amid declining ad sales and growing competition from new media.

In November, the parent company posted a third-quarter loss of $90.2 million – compared with a year-ago profit of $279.7 million – as sales fell 3.8 percent year-over-year to $1.68 billion led by declines in radio and outdoor advertising.

“There have been a lot of layoffs in the radio and TV industry. … It’s really an industry-wide event,” David Joyce, analyst for Miller Tabak & Co. in New York, told the San Antonio Express-News.

Clear Channel Communications Inc. – a global media and entertainment company, founded in 1972, that owns or operates more than 2,000 radio stations nationwide – is a subsidiary of the San Antonio-based CC Media Holdings Inc. (OTCBB: CCMO). Its Clear Channel Radio Providence division is the operator of local stations 920 WHJJ-AM talk radio, 94 WHJY-FM, 93.3 WSNE “Coast FM” and WWBB-FM “B101.” Additional information is available at www.ClearChannel.com .