Biz Buzz for May 2007: The latest comings and goings

(Now a monthly feature on the SABEW web site)

By Chris Roush croush@email.unc.edu

KANSAS MOVES ON TO NEW VENTURE

The Wall Street Journal’s Dave Kansas, editor of the paper’s Money & Investing section, leaves the print publication to head a joint venture between parent Dow Jones & Co. and another company to start a personal finance web site aimed at a younger audience.

Kansas, whose term as SABEW president ends in May at the annual conference in Orange County, Calif., will be president of the new venture, which will hire an undetermined number of business journalists.

Nik Deogun, who has been a deputy editor at the paper’s Washington bureau, is moving to New York to replace Kansas as head of the Money & Investing section.

Deogun served as a deputy bureau chief in Washington for the last three years. For the three years before that he headed the media, marketing and entertainment reporting group in New York. Deogun joined the Journal in 1994 in Atlanta, where he covered Coca-Cola.

Monica Langley, a news editor at the paper and author of a book on Sandy Weill, replaces Doegun as deputy bureau chief in D.C.

Kansas is no stranger to Internet business journalism ventures. He left the Journal in 1996 to become editor-in-chief of TheStreet.com, helping that site get launched.
Kansas returned to the Journal in 2001 to become deputy ME of WSJ.com. He was named editor of the Money & Investing section in 2003.

“We will hire a team of journalists, but exact figures aren't finalized,” Kansas told Biz Buzz. “Should be fun!”

JOB SHUFFLE AT LA TIMES

A number of new editors have been named on the Los Angeles Times business news desk, according to a memo from biz editor Davan Maharaj.

Maharaj named Julie Makinen as the section’s deputy business editor, senior markets editor John Corrigan as senior news editor, West executive editor Anne Reifenberg as enterprise editor, and reporter Chris Gaither as technology editor.

In 2004, Makinen took a leave from the paper to work with the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, training journalists in Afghanistan. Since January 2006, she has been deputy weekend editor. Makinen succeeds Maharaj. She holds degrees from Stanford and UCLA.

Corrigan, the paper’s senior markets editor and a SABEW board member, has been with the biz section since 2001. During his tenure Corrigan has piled up an impressive body of work. He was project editor for the 2003 series “The Wal-Mart Effect,” which won the Pulitzer Prize for national reporting, and the 2006 series “Retirement at Risk.” He has overseen coverage of several major stories, including the Enron scandal, the labor strife at West Coast ports, the California supermarket strike and abuses by mortgage lender Ameriquest.

Reifenberg joined The Times in 2003 after nearly a decade at the Wall Street Journal. In a previous posting, at the Dallas Morning News, she was the lead writer on a series about violence against women that won the Pulitzer Prize for international reporting for 1993. Reifenberg's position was created out of a vacancy from 2006.

Gaither joined the Times from the Boston Globe in 2004. He succeeds Aaron Curtiss, who held the technology editor job for five years before moving to the paper's innovation team.

In his time on the tech beat, Gaither covered the business of Internet media and advertising from the San Francisco bureau. He chronicled the growing power of new media giants such as Yahoo, Google and Microsoft's MSN, and the interactive efforts of TV networks and other traditional media companies.

TWO NEW EDITORS AT ACBJ PAPERS

Charlotte-based American City Business Journals names new editors at two of its weekly business newspapers, according to Beth Hunt, manager of editorial operations.

Dave Raiford was promoted to editor of the Nashville Business Journal, succeeding Geert DeLombaerde, who left the company in December. Raiford joined the Business Journal in 2000 as a reporter covering technology and later health care. He was named sections editor three years later and served in that capacity before being named managing editor last year.

Before joining ACBJ, Raiford was a reporter with The Town Talk in Alexandria, La., and prior to that, worked as a reporter for the Canon City Daily in Canon City, Colo., and the Daily Rocket-Miner in Rock Springs, Wyo.

Al Pacciorini was named editor of the East Bay Business Times, succeeding Mike Hytha, who left the company. Pacciorini joins the Business Times from the San Francisco Examiner, where he has served as business editor.

His journalism career also includes stints as editor of the Tri-Valley Herald, editor of The Argus, business editor of the Monterey County Herald, and assistant city editor of the Oakland Tribune.

Meanwhile, Alwyn Scott becomes managing editor of the Puget Sound Business Journal, another ACBJ paper. Scott had been business projects reporter for the Seattle Times. He previously worked as a news editor at The Wall Street Journal Europe in Brussels, as equity news editor for Europe, as London bureau chief, and as Bangkok bureau chief for Dow Jones Newswires.

BOSS WATCH

Stephen Keating, the biz editor of the Denver Post, steps down from his position in April to launch a new website for the Colorado paper’s political coverage. Keating is a SABEW governor…Sean Gannon becomes the new biz editor at the New York Post... Ashley Bergthold becomes the biz editor at the Cookeville Herald-Citizen in Tennessee…Christina Davis becomes the new editor of the Worcester Business Journal, succeeding Christina O’Neill, who will remain at the paper as a consulting editor…. Dow Jones Newswires AME Robert McGough and news editor Pat Sullivan lead the newly formed editorial team for Dow Jones Wealth Manager.

ALONG THE EAST COAST

Former Wall Street Journal reporter Dean Starkman takes over writing Columbia Journalism Review’s “The Audit” blog about business journalism…Harold Brubaker at the Philadelphia Inquirer turn his gaze upon the financial services sector -- banking, insurance and investing companies. He’ll continue to keep an eye on the Campbell Soup Co., and -- since it’s hard to keep a boy from Lancaster County off of the farm -- write the occasional where-the-food-comes-from-story...Jennifer Kingson leaves her post as BusinessDay weekend editor at The New York Times to become deputy media editor at the paper. Kingson has also been as a business staff editor and a business reporter. David Joachim, a copy editor, replaces Kingson as the BusinessDay weekend editor. Also, Katherine Seelye leaves her biz desk reporting position covering the media to write about the election for the paper’s web site. She is replaced by Richard Perez-Pena from the Metro desk…Vineeta Anand leaves the Washington bureau of Bloomberg News….David McPherson, deputy biz editor of The Providence Journal, steps down to start a financial planning firm, Four Ponds Financial Planning. As deputy biz editor, he had earned a certificate in financial planning from Boston University and passed the Certified Financial Planner certification exam. “I loved the 20 years I spent in the news business, but I was ready for a new challenge and my work as a business reporter and editor gave me the entrepreneurial bug,” he says.

WAY DOWN SOUTH

Garrison Wells joins the Nashville Business Journal as ME, replacing Dave Raiford, who was promoted to editor. Most recently, Wells was biz editor of The Sun News in Myrtle Beach, S.C. Prior to that, he was biz editor of The Lansing State Journal in Lansing, Mich….Knoxville News Sentinel reporter Roger Harris is promoted to assistant biz editor at the paper, and Josh Flory joins the paper to cover real estate and economic development.

IN THE HEARTLAND

Fort Wayne Business Weekly publisher Rob Kaiser, who had been a biz reporter for the Chicago Tribune before becoming the Fort Wayne paper’s editor in 2005, leaves to buy his own business publication.

OUT WEST

Arizona Republic biz columnist Jon Talton leaves the paper after a reorganization eliminates his column…Christie Smythe comes to the Arizona Daily Star from Massachusetts, where she was biz reporter for the Cape Cod Times. Smythe replaces Levi Long, who takes a job on the Star's features desk. Shelley Shelton, formerly a reporter in the Star’s Northwest office, moves to the main newsroom to cover consumer issues. She’s taken on stories as diverse as utility rate-cases, labor-law violations and the changeover to all-digital TV…Mark Boslet joins the San Jose Mercury News to cover technology. He previously had been with Dow Jones Newswires…Sarah Colwell, a business reporter for the Colorado Springs Gazette who made an impression on readers with her first-person stories about her husband being deployed in Iraq, was laid off at the paper.

AT THE GLOSSIES

Adrienne Carter leaves BusinessWeek’s Chicago bureau, where she covered food companies, to work in the main New York office as an editor. Leigh Gallagher leaves as a senior editor at SmartMoney for the same title at Fortune. She had been at SmartMoney since early 2004 covering finance, real estate and travel. Prior to that, she was a staff writer with Forbes. Jason Tanz joins Wired as a senior editor covering business. He comes from Fortune Small Business, where was a senior editor.

ON THE AIR

Business correspondent Valerie Morris leaves CNN to anchor a syndicated weekly program…Wall Street Journal staff reporter Lee Hawkins begins work as an on-air contributor at CNBC as part of the Journal’s content sharing agreement with the cable network. Previously, Hawkins worked in the paper’s Detroit bureau covering GM. Also, Trish Regan joins CNBC from CBS News as a general assignment reporter. She previously had also worked at CBS Marketwatch and Bloomberg Television… Kate Shepherd assumes responsibilities as anchor of afternoon Inside INdiana Business Radio reports.

AND THE WINNER IS

The Wall Street Journal’s series of stories on backdating of stock options wins the business reporting category in the 73rd annual National Headliner Awards. The reporters on the series are Charles Forelle, James Bandler and Mark Maremont. Second place goes to Greg Burns of the Chicago Tribune for “College has become less affordable,” while third place goes to reporters Jim Adams, R.G. Dunlap and Caroline Lynch Pieroni of The Courier-Journal in Louisville for “Selling a dream, buying a nightmare.”… Steve Everly of the Kansas City Star receives $10,000 and the William Brewster Styles award in the Scripps Howard Foundation’s National Journalism Awards for "Hot Fuel," a story about how a simple law of physics - liquids expand with rising temperatures - costs warm weather consumers millions of dollars a year…The Cleveland Plain Dealer biz staff wins an award from the New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants for best in-depth financial journalism for a series of stories about funding retirement in the United States.

IN MEMORIUM

August Maggy, a copy editor with the San Francisco Chronicle’s biz section, dies in late March after a short illness. He was 60. He had been with the paper for nearly 23 years, and colleagues remembered him as an “old-school journalist.” In the paper’s obituary, biz editor Ken Howe stated, “I learned a great deal from his sometimes pointed questions about newspapering and business journalism, and I came to respect his views greatly, especially because I knew they came from experience and a long institutional memory.” Maggy had also worked at the Contra Costa Independent and the Vallejo Times-Herald.

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Posted April 29, 2007