After 19 years as Tribune editor, goodbye — and thank you

After nearly 20 years at The Tribune, I begin my retirement today; a search for my successor is underway.

I look forward to continuing my involvement in the community, which includes teaching journalism at Cal Poly.

I have loved tackling the issues facing our communities, meeting you — and ensuring that our coverage is useful and relevant, striving to keep government honest and readers informed.

We all strive to impact lives in different ways. Mine was through journalism. By the time I was a junior in high school, I knew I wanted to be a reporter. I was nosy and I enjoyed writing. By the time I graduated from Northwestern University, other reasons bolstered my resolve: improving the lives of others; provoking change.

Before arriving in San Luis Obispo, I had worked in Wisconsin, New Jersey and Kentucky. I never expected to stay so long here, but as many of you know, this place grows on you.

I’ve stayed in this news business longer than many solely because I believe that real journalists can make a difference.

Consider, for example, The Tribune’s four-part series last year sharing the lessons learned from small communities like ours when their nuclear power plants closed. Without that information, some local elected officials told us, they wouldn’t have received the settlement package they did from PG&E.

More recently, two of our investigative stories spurred action.

In August, a story questioning the then-SLO County coroner’s ruling citing LSD as the cause of death of a young woman prompted the coroner to reverse his ruling one month later.

And in September a story documenting the horrific condition of Pirate’s Cove prompted the county Board of Supervisors to finally take steps to clean it up.

Equally as important, The Tribune follows a strong code of ethics:

▪  When we pursue a story, we check with multiple sources who are in a position to have firsthand information about the issue. We identify ourselves as Tribune staff, explain why we’re calling and the information we’re seeking.

▪  We strive to provide the proper context for our stories by interviewing enough people and backgrounding ourselves so that we have framed the story correctly.

▪  We always name sources unless information that is critical to a story can only be obtained by promising anonymity — and on those rare occasions when we do grant anonymity, we typically require two sources who know the information firsthand.

▪  If we make a mistake, we correct that error in a transparent way so you know exactly what we’re correcting.

▪  We don’t exchange news for advertising.

We also often deliberate this important question: Does the public’s right to know outweigh the individual’s right to privacy?

Our new publisher, Ken Riddick, espouses these same values.

We take these steps and more to ensure the independence and integrity of our news report. You and other readers count on us — and trust us — for that independence.

To be sure, some of you haven’t always agreed with our news coverage, editorials or even our choice of comic strips. We’ve appreciated your feedback, good — and yes, bad.

Given the adversarial partisan atmosphere that’s affecting all levels of government — including SLO County — we try to be objective on news pages and open to opposing views on opinion pages.

We value interacting with readers, whether it’s through Letters to the Editor, commentaries, forums or social media like Facebook.

In recent months, some community members have approached me, saying they’re worried that print will disappear.

But the fact is:

We are no longer a newspaper company.

We are a digital news and advertising operation that also produces a print publication. And, we are growing.

Our total readership is climbing double-digits.

Monthly unique visitors to sanluisobispo.com are up 44 percent year-to-date.

Our videos get tens of thousands of views every month. One recent month our videos garnered almost 300,000 page views and one video alone got 140,000 views.

Our advertising team places ads for customers nationwide, thanks to our parent company McClatchy’s vast network.

So if you want to support real journalism — and connect with a broad audience — support The Tribune.

Buy us however you want. In print. Through a digital subscription. Or our e-edition — which looks just like The Tribune but offers an extra 30 pages daily of news, sports, business and features.

Although my last day at The Tribune was Friday, it will forever be a part of me.

Our staff is outstanding. Their only mission, like mine, is to shed light in our communities — to make a difference by giving you the information you need to make wise decisions on local issues. Please remember that.

It has truly been an honor and privilege to work with them — and serve you — through the years. I am certain that my successor will feel the same.

Thank you.

This story was originally published December 2, 2017 at 11:08 AM with the headline "After 19 years as Tribune editor, goodbye — and thank you."