The President and CEO of the Deseret News is once again making big changes to the state’s oldest daily paper. Clark Gilbert has named a national editor, publisher and a Utah edition editor. Gilbert says the changes reflect the newspaper’s recent transition.
“These three individuals are three great leaders,” he says. “But they bring very three very distinct and needed skillsets to an industry that’s in transition and to an organization like the Deseret News that is growing very rapidly.”
National Editor Paul Edwards joined Deseret News in 2010. He’s a former judicial law clerk and editor for the California Law Review. Publisher Christopher Lee, who also joined the paper in 2010 worked for Ancestry-dot-com was Chairman and CEO at Heritage Makers and was recently nominated to serve on the board of the Suburban Newspaper Association of America. And the new local edition editor, Rick Hall has been with Deseret News since 1974 and has served as the paper’s managing editor since 1998.
“And the three members of that team together really show,” he says. “The model of the future newspaper in America, digital innovation and expansion, strengthened with investment in journalism, particularly in areas where you can be unique and differentiated and tight alignment in a local market in areas of strength.”
Gilbert says Lee is qualified because of his web background, saying he’s given the paper’s website national reach. He adds Edwards has strengthened the paper’s investigative journalism and editorial page and Hall is committed to the local market.
Last year, the Deseret News laid off 80 employees and moved into the Triad Center with KSL TV and KSL Newsradio in an effort to refocus its business model.
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