Marty Kaiser of 'Milwaukee Journal Sentinel' Gets Nod as 'E&P' Editor of the Year for 2009

By: Mark Fitzgerald Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Editor and Senior Vice President Martin Kaiser is Editor & Publisher's Editor of the Year, E&P announced Monday.

In its February cover story, E&P notes that Kaiser was selected for the honor at a time of harsh newsroom reductions at newspapers all across the country -- leading to prominent editors being fired or resigning for refusing to make further cuts. Kaiser, though, told E&P he believes this is a particularly bad time for editors to abandon their newsrooms.

"It's a matter of leadership," Kaiser tells E&P. "If you're passionate about journalism and care about the work you do, you help the newsroom, the whole news organization, get through any kind of times."

The Journal Communications-owned Journal Sentinel has not been immune from the industry recession, and has reduced staff with two voluntary buyout programs within the space of less than a year.

Yet, E&P notes that amidst the financial distress, the Sentinel won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting for David Umhoefer's expose of county officials rigging the pension system to pad their benefits. The Pulitzer -- the newspaper's first since 1977 -- was just one highlight of Journal Sentinel journalism. Science reporter Suzanne Rustled a team that won the prestigious John B. Oakes Award for Environmental Reporting this year for "Chemical Fallout," an expos? of how federal agencies have failed to protect the public from carcinogenic chemicals found in plastic used for baby bottles, food packaging, and household products.

Kaiser is leading the newspaper through the rough waters menacing
all big city dailies by emphasizing ... journalism, of all things. ?Times like these force you to say, ?What?s special, what are the stories that matter,? where can you have impact,? he says. When Kaiser gathers the newsroom together for a talk, which he does fairly regularly, he talks journalism.

And he cultivates the feeling, forgotten in so many newspaper shops now, that putting out a paper is fun. ?Marty is always using sports metaphors, and he tells us all the time, he wants to go for home runs ? no singles or doubles,? says reporter Bill Glauber, who covers aging and demographics and who worked for Kaiser in the sports department of the Baltimore Sun back in the 1980s.

If the staff is having fun even in these parlous times ? and a surprising number of people will tell you they are ? it?s because Kaiser has turned the newsroom to his view of staff reductions, says Managing Editor George Stanley: ?We never look back on what we had.?

The full profile is available here for E&P subscribers, in the "In Print" section.

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This story has been corrected to reflect the fact that the 2008 Pulitzer was the first the Journal Sentinel has won since the Journal and Sentinel were merged, and its first for either paper since 1977.