BURGIN'S CHANGES AT SAN FRANCISCO'S EXAMINER

By: Joel Davis San Francisco Paper Isn't Getting Any Worse, He Says


David Burgin, new chief editor for the Fang-owned The San Francisco
Examiner, had a simple strategy when he took over perhaps the most
disastrous launch since the Titanic. "I tried not to make it any worse," said
Burgin, who doesn't mince words when talking of righting an ailing startup
maligned for sloppy editing, staff turnover, and production glitches.

In fact, Burgin, 62, concedes criticism of the Examiner is deserved. "We
had it coming," Burgin said. "There may be reasons for it, but there are no
excuses for it. It was so pathetic, it kind of drummed up sympathy."

A large man who looks like a cross between Marlon Brando and Rod Steiger -
in their later years - Burgin is a self-described swashbuckler who hobbles
around the Examiner's downtown digs on an imposing cane fashioned out of
a baseball bat. (He's a former sports editor.) While it's his first time working
for the Fangs, it is not his first stint at the Ex: Burgin was editor of the
Hearst Corp.-owned Examiner from 1985 to 1986, when he was fired by Will
Hearst.

While still on the thin side with a modest advertising count, the
Examiner looks and reads better since Burgin took over the top editor's
post from Martha Steffens. He said he's made 100 little changes to the
Examiner. He instituted a daily Q-and-A column on Page One, added a "The"
before "Examiner" in the masthead (it's more emphatic, he said), and hired P.J.
Corkery, a columnist Burgin freely admits is instructed to parrot the style of
the late San Francisco institution, Herb Caen.

Although Steffens has supposedly been retained as a consultant, Burgin said he's
never met or talked to her. He nevertheless feels sympathy for her, noting that
the paper should never have hired an outsider in such a bare-fisted and
"difficult" newspaper town. While Steffens was adamant about Publisher Ted Fang
staying out of the newsroom, Burgin welcomes his input and even has an office
next to him. "Fang can take a seat in the middle of the newsroom for all I
care," Burgin said. "The paper belongs to the Fangs - it's their voice."

Burgin calls his approach to the Examiner a marriage of dignity to
irreverence, and said it would be a mistake to compete directly with the much
larger San Francisco Chronicle. "If you compare us to the
Chronicle at any level, we're going to get killed," he noted. What the
Examiner can do best is focus intensely on the city of San Francisco
itself, he believes. "I'm not sure it's been fun. I'm not sure I'm enjoying it,"
Burgin said. "But it's been interesting."



Joel Davis (jdavis@editorandpublisher.com) is West Coast editor for E&P.



Copyright 2001, Editor & Publisher.