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Tell E&P your IAN story.

Editor & Publisher (E&P) is dedicating this page featuring our own exclusive content along with access to news from other sources, on how our fellow news publishers are faring though, and continuing to report on the impact of Hurricane Ian. Please tell us your Ian story by contacting contributing editor Gretchen Peck at gretchenapeck@gmail.com

Exclusive from the E&P Newsroom

Storm prepping is paramount at The Post and Courier

Autumn Phillips is the executive editor at The Post and Courier in Charleston, South Carolina. “This was a very unpredictable storm. It seemed that we didn’t know what it was going to do and where it was going to hit, even hours before it reached us,” Phillips reflected a little more than a week after the hurricane carved its path north, hugging the country’s coastline.

The Herald-Advocate faces flooding, lack of official communication in hurricane coverage

Tom Staik is the managing editor of The Herald-Advocate in Hardee County, Florida.  “That is a new normal. We’ve had search helicopters since this happened,” he said as one hovered overhead.  The Herald-Advocate publishes its paper on Wednesdays. The day the hurricane landed, Staik and his team talked about how people were prepping for the storm. Before the latest news on crime and sports, the paper featured stories about people installing plywood and school teachers prepping classrooms and tech equipment in case of water damage. 

Hurricane Ian won’t stop our FPA members’ forward momentum

Florida newspapers and their dedicated staffs were there for their communities before, during, and after the hurricanes. And that was certainly the case over the last several days as we saw journalists in Southwest Florida rally in a way to cover Hurricane Ian as the massive storm approached and left its destruction in the very communities they call home. It was the same with our industry’s market leads, GMs, publishers and the production folks who were also instrumental, whether publishing in print or online, in making sure local readers were given the tools they needed to lessen the storm’s impact.

Hometown News Florida publishes on time, no matter the weather

Anna-Marie Menhenott is the managing editor for the Treasure Coast and Brevard County editions of Hometown News. Menhenott lives in Ft. Pierce on Florida’s east coast, which has known its fair share of high-category hurricanes.

Hurricane Ian inspired an all-hands-on-deck approach to coverage at the Observer Media Group

Eric Garwood is the managing editor for the Longboat Observer and Sarasota Observer in Florida. The Longboat Observer is the paper of record in Longboat Key, a coastal and barrier-island community of approximately 7,500 residents. The Sarasota Observer informs a city of 55,000 residents plus readers beyond the city limits.

Tampa Bay Times’ journalist Zack Sampson shares perspective on covering Hurricane Ian.

Zachary “Zack” Sampson is on the investigative team at the Tampa Bay Times. He’s also a member of “the hurricane team,” which includes investigative, breaking news and beat reporters. “We prepare for hurricanes here well before the hurricane even forms,” Sampson said. “They have a season, June through November, so we have hurricane training once a year to go through with the staff how to stay safe, what coverage expectations are and how to go about getting that coverage."

The Naples Daily News reporters file stories, despite power and cell interruptions — and great personal loss

Wendy Fullerton Powell is one of the hundreds of thousands of Florida residents with homes without power. Her house and neighborhood were severely damaged by Hurricane Ian’s violent storm surge. As executive editor at the Naples Daily News, Powell is leading the newsroom’s journalists as they so many of them report on the storm’s wrath while attempting to recover and rebuild their own lives. E&P spoke with her by phone the Saturday after the storm. While she recounted her team’s experiences covering the hurricane, she watched in the distance as helicopters continued to evacuate residents from islands off the coast.   
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More on Hurricane Ian Coverage

As journalists, we need to change the way we cover disasters

Fewer tragic narratives about survivors, more stories about the causes of coastal disasters and who benefits from government rebuilding grants.

Why Hurricane Ian brought the college journalism classroom to mind

A recent natural disaster highlighted the importance of what journalism educators do every day.

Media coverage of hurricanes reinforces images of people of color as victims, study finds

As Hurricane Ian made landfall, devastating parts of Florida, South Carolina and the Caribbean, readers saw media images of destruction, rescues and recovery. How images from such disasters are presented often cast people in certain roles.

These Florida morning show hosts stayed on the air for 12 hours after Hurricane Ian

Last Friday, after Hurricane Ian shifted south and devastated southwest Florida, David Jones and Meredith Michaels stayed on the air for 12 hours talking with callers, finding answers and crowdsourcing information.

Journalists want to know: Can we use your disaster photo, please?

Journalists pleading with regular people to republish their images of a natural disaster has become an almost daily ritual on social media, where local, national and global outlets search constantly for newsworthy images taken by regular people.
More Exclusives from the E&P Newsroom
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with the outspoken reporter for Media News Group's Pottstown (PA) Mercury, Evan Brandt, where we explore what it is like to be the last local journalist remaining at this "ghost paper" that serves a suburban Philadelphia community of over 40,000. Brandt offers insight into his 25+ years at The Mercury, the several ownership bankruptcies that created years of serial downsizing, and how today he works out of his own attic to cover beats once reported on by a team of 30+ reporters.
The world of philanthropy was burgeoning in 1988. But there was no unified source of information for the diverse group of charities and nonprofits until The Chronicle of Philanthropy began publishing. The monthly magazine reports on issues impacting the world that other journalists cover, such as climate change and democracy, but approaches them through a nonprofit lens.
Employees who are happy with their current employers aren’t likely to be tempted into another position. So, how do you ensure you don't lose your people to a new, more appealing offer? Simple. You become the other job. Instead of the boring person at home, you become the mistress.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we explore the Tri-City Record, a new, five-day-a-week free publication serving San Juan County, New Mexico, being launched by Ballentine Communications, the owners of the Durango (CO) Herald. We learn from board chairman/ owner Richard G. Ballentine and new Record Publisher David Cook why they believe there is a real opportunity for expansion into this area already served by an existing Gannett title since that paper has drastically cut back on staff and content over the past few years.
Collaboration among news media outlets is not new, but The Exchange is a new collaborative effort that aims to create business and financial content for underserved communities. It’s a collaboration of local, diverse news media with decades of service to their communities, the Local Media Association (LMA), the Local Media Consortium (LMC) and Deloitte.

Access more "Exclusives" from the E&P Newsroom

The new owners of The Weekly Recorder — three lifelong residents who are active in their communities — acknowledge the challenge of entering the newspaper business when other newspapers, both locally and nationwide, are struggling. But, they believe there's an opportunity and much to highlight within Washington County.
The “gender beat” concept developed less than a decade ago, but it has already evolved significantly since then. While many of the journalists interviewed by Meg Heckman, a journalist, author and educator with Northeastern University, thought the concept of a gender beat should not be necessary, she believes it is a necessary stepping stone in the short term.
Across the country, more and more "ghost papers" are appearing, where you may find no publisher or editor; and a newsroom with just one reporter left. In some cases, entire “beats” have disappeared — where cities and large regions have no one covering the news. What happens to these journalists and to the communities they serve? In some cases a news desert remains. In others, we find competing media companies stepping in to fill the void.
In the digital age, an increasing number of publications choose to eliminate their print issues and move entirely online. However, those publications with a loyal print subscriber base are left to choose between a myriad of local carriers or the United States Postal Service (USPS). There is no correct answer. Publications must do the research and evaluate the market.
Journalists from all over the world traveled to Ohio in early spring for the Kiplinger Fellowship. There were 19 fellows this year, representing 12 nations. They had the added distinction of being the program’s 50th-anniversary class. Kevin Z. Smith, the Kiplinger Program’s executive director, spoke with E&P about the evolution of the fellowship program.
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