SACRAMENTO, Calif.,
Jan. 12, 2018 /PRNewswire/ --
McClatchy (NYSE American: MNI) today announced a new regional
structure for news and named Robyn
Tomlin and Lauren Gustus as
Regional Editors. Tomlin, currently Managing Editor at The
Dallas Morning News, will be based in Raleigh, North Carolina, and will be
responsible for the seven McClatchy newsrooms in the Carolinas.
Gustus, currently Executive Editor of McClatchy's
Star-Telegram in Fort Worth,
Texas, will be based in Sacramento and will be responsible for
McClatchy's five California
newsrooms plus The Idaho Statesman in Boise. They will begin in their new roles in
February.
"We couldn't be more excited about the two passionate
journalists who will lead our efforts to innovate faster,
collaborate more effectively and serve our readers better," said
Tim Grieve, McClatchy's Vice
President of News.
McClatchy launched a program of Newsroom Reinvention in 2017 to
accelerate its digital growth and ensure that each of its newsrooms
can deliver what readers need in a fast-changing news environment.
Newsroom Reinvention has led to record digital readership for
McClatchy and high-impact journalism that holds leaders and
institutions accountable, including a recent Kansas City
Star series on secrecy in the Kansas government and a Fresno Bee
project on the high teen birth rate in California's San
Joaquin Valley.
"The new structure will sharpen our local focus and increase the
pace and cadence of our digital transformation," said Craig Forman, President and CEO of
McClatchy.
Under the new structure, each McClatchy newsroom will have a
local editor, committed to producing journalism that matters to the
local community. And there will also be a regional editor
responsible for ensuring that the newsrooms work together
effectively and are pushing forward to the company's digital
future. McClatchy expects the regional structure to roll out
nationwide over the course of the next year.
In North Carolina, Tomlin will
oversee The News & Observer in Raleigh, The Charlotte Observer and
The Herald Sun in Durham.
In South Carolina, she will be
responsible for The Island Packet in Hilton Head, The Beaufort Gazette, The
Sun News in Myrtle Beach,
The State in Columbia and
The Herald in Rock
Hill.
The move will be a homecoming for Tomlin, who graduated from the
University of North Carolina. She has
been managing editor at The Dallas Morning News for two
years after serving as vice president and chief digital officer at
Pew Research Center and as founding editor of Digital First Media's
Project Thunderdome in New York
City.
She was director of editorial innovation for the New York Times
Regional Media Group and served as editor at the StarNews in
Wilmington, North Carolina, the
Ocala (Florida) Star-Banner and the
TimesDaily in Florence,
Alabama.
Gustus will be responsible for McClatchy's founding news
organization, The Sacramento Bee, as well as its other
California newsrooms -- The
Fresno Bee, The Modesto Bee, The Merced Sun-Star
and The Tribune in San Luis
Obispo. She will also oversee The Idaho Statesman in
Boise.
Gustus joined McClatchy in 2017 as Vice President/Executive
Editor of the Star-Telegram in Fort Worth, where her talent for innovation
and public service journalism has helped reporters dramatically
increase their readership and their impact. She was previously
Executive Editor of the (Fort Collins) Coloradoan, and
worked at the Los Angeles Daily News and the Salt Lake
Tribune before joining the Reno Gazette-Journal, where
she rose from Sports Editor to Deputy Editor.
McClatchy announced several other new appointments:
Joe Kieta, currently the Editor
of The Modesto Bee, will become the Editor of The Fresno
Bee, succeeding Jim Boren, who
announced his retirement last year. Kieta has nearly 17 years'
experience as a top editor and has led two other McClatchy
newsrooms -- the Merced Sun-Star, which he joined in
2001, and the Ledger-Enquirer in Columbus, Ga., from 2010-2012.
Prior to Merced, Kieta served
in various editing and reporting roles at the Times Leader
in Wlikes-Barre, Pa., The Tribune in San Luis Obispo, Calif., and The Daily
Telegram in Adrian, Mich.
Colleen McCain Nelson, Editorial
Page Editor at The Kansas City Star, will take on a
broader role as McClatchy Opinion Editor, with a focus on elevating
McClatchy's opinion work nationwide, to increase impact and
community engagement. She will take on this new role while
continuing to lead Kansas City's
editorial board.
John Drescher, who has championed
accountability journalism as Executive Editor of The
(Raleigh) News & Observer
since 2007, will become Opinion and Solutions Editor in
Raleigh, a role that will
capitalize on his deep knowledge of North
Carolina, and on his staunch commitment to holding
government and institutions accountable.
McClatchy also announced that Joyce
Terhaar has decided to leave The Sacramento Bee after
30 years in the newsroom, the last seven as Executive Editor.
In a note to the newsroom at The Bee, Terhaar said she
found her work at The Bee "tremendously satisfying, largely
because of the talented journalists here who are committed to work
that has impact, who do the difficult reporting to hold the
powerful accountable, and who write stories that matter to this
community."
"Joyce has been a strong advocate for journalism, for
McClatchy and for The Bee, and we'll miss her intelligence, her
insights and her passion for the job," Grieve said.
About McClatchy
McClatchy operates 30 media companies in 14 states, providing
each of its communities with high-quality news and advertising
services in a wide array of digital and print formats. McClatchy is
a publisher of iconic brands such as the Miami Herald, The
Kansas City Star, The Sacramento Bee, The Charlotte Observer,
The (Raleigh) News &
Observer, and the (Fort Worth)
Star-Telegram. McClatchy is headquartered in Sacramento, Calif., and listed on the New York
Stock Exchange American under the symbol MNI.
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SOURCE McClatchy