Long-time staffer Christopher Twarowski succeeds former editor Michael Patrick Nelson.
The Long Island Press racked up 22 total prizes at the 2011 Society of Professional Journalists’ Press Club of Long Island Media Awards.
Michael Patrick Nelson, who been with the Press since its inception in 2003, was most recently managing editor. He will take over as the paper's top editor following Robbie Woliver's departure last summer. "No one knows the Press better than Michael and he has earned the respect of not only every reporter in the newsroom but everyone in our organization," says publisher Jed Morey. "We're all excited about the Nelson era."
He replaces Pat Kelly, publisher for the past six years, who "traded our local glitz for a beachcomber's life in Mexico," according to the Weekly. Spotleson, who helped launch the Weekly in 1998, has also worked on the editorial side within the New Times chain. There have been other moves in the paper's offices recently. Sales manager Nelson Oshita is now associate publisher, and the paper picked up two new staffers from Las Vegas Life: managing editor Ken Miller and associate editor T.R. Witcher.
Anyone "familiar with the alternative newspaper industry in Pittsburgh would have seen failure coming" at the Madison, Wis. faux-alt, argues Indiana University of Pennsylvania student Emily Jo Boots in the school newspaper. According to Boots, the Core Weekly train wreck was foreseeable because the paper was the brainchild of Catherine Nelson, the same publisher who oversaw the demise of both In Pittsburgh and Pulp in the Steel City. "It sounds to me like Nelson thinks that dumbing down a newspaper will make everyone want to read it," Boots writes after summarizing Core Weekly's business plan. "It seems that Nelson didn’t learn a thing when her business philosophy as a publishing consultant ran Pulp into the ground."
Catherine Nelson, associate publisher of AAN member Shepherd Express in Milwaukee, Wis., is scheduled to deliver a lecture titled "There Are Alternatives" at the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association convention next month. The PNA Web site describes Nelson, who was formerly publisher of two Pittsburgh alt-weeklies that went out of business, as "an industry guru on alternative papers." In addition to her position at Shepherd Express, Nelson presently serves as publisher of the new, daily-owned Core Weekly, which competes with AAN member Isthmus in Madison, Wis. (Scroll down the linked page to read about Nelson's lecture.)
Brad Nelson, the 33-year-old founder, editor and publisher of Duluth, Minnesota’s Ripsaw News, moonlights as the drummer for the blues-rocking Black-Eyed Snakes. Although he occasionally leaves the paper for weeks at a time to join the band on tour, Ripsaw has helped revitalize the city’s small indie scene and raised its political awareness.
Catherine Nelson, former publisher of In Pittsburgh, is returning to the market with a new weekly, Pulp, scheduled to launch March 15. Indiana Printing and Publishing Co., the owner, plans a local news, arts and entertainment publication. Steel City Media, owner of Pittsburgh City Paper, bought In Pittsburgh in September and closed it.
