Newspaper & Mailroom

The New York Times Expands Bay Area Report

Friday 16. October 2009 - Added Pages to Run Fridays and Sundays First in a Series of Local Print and Online Initiatives

The New York Times announced today an expanded Bay Area metro report with added pages of local content on Fridays and Sundays in the San Francisco area. The Bay Area report will launch on Friday, Oct. 16. The new pages will complement the national and global coverage that long has made The Times a popular news provider in the region.
The Bay Area pages initially will be written and edited by New York Times journalists and contributors and will include enterprising coverage of local concerns, focusing on public affairs, culture and lifestyles in San Francisco, the Silicon Valley, the East Bay and the region. The pages will expand on the work of The Times’s 10-person San Francisco news bureau and its already extensive coverage of the Bay Area.
A longer-term objective of this initiative is to work with local journalists and news organizations in a collaborative way, first in the Bay Area and then in other major markets around the country. The Times is in discussions with news organizations in the Bay Area about supplying journalism for these pages.
“At a time when so many news organizations are in a forced retreat, it’s exciting to be part of a venture that has set out to build more and better news coverage,” said Bill Keller, executive editor of The Times. “And as someone who grew up in the Bay Area, I’m proud that we can play a role in enriching the quality of reporting about the region.”
Felicity Barringer, a long-time reporter and editor for The Times, will edit the pages. Daniel Weintraub, who has covered California politics and public affairs for more than two decades, including for the past nine years as the public affairs columnist for the Sacramento Bee, will write a politics column. Scott James, a journalist and novelist who has written about Bay Area life for the past 10 years and is the founder of San Francisco’s SoMa Literary Review, will write a local column.
These stories and columns will also appear on NYTimes.com. Next week, The Times will introduce a blog called “The Bay Area,” designed to complement the print pages by leading a conversation about the top stories of interest to people in the region.
The Times also is in conversations with potential news providers in Chicago to provide the same kind of regional report, devoted to local news and written by local reporters with deep roots in the community. The added pages and online components for both editions will be supported by local advertising.
“We believe there is potential to collaborate with local publishers by printing and distributing pages in The Times and adding regional content online,” said Scott Heekin-Canedy, president and general manager of The Times. “The right alliances will bring together trusted brands and will provide additional quality local content for our readers.”