The Minneapolis Star Tribune, ranked as the United State's 15th largest newspaper, announced Friday it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

With the significant deterioration in our revenue in 2008 and the challenging outlook for our industry for 2009, we simply could not wait any longer to take this step, Star Tribune Publisher and Chairman Chris Harte said in a statement on the Newspaper's website.

Our plan is to use the court-supervised process to reduce our costs, strengthen our balance sheet and create a financially viable business, Harte added.

The Star Tribune said it has enough cash to continue its operations and does not anticipate needing debtor-in-possession financing. The newspaper listed assets of $493.2 million and liabilities of $661.1 million in its Chapter 11 filing.

During the reorganization process, the company plans to continue to operate as usual publishing its newspaper and website without interruption.

The Star Tribune has a weekday circulation of about 322,000 and Sunday circulation of almost 521,000 and employs 1,400 people. It was bought by private equity group Avista Capital Partners in 2007 for $530 million.