NEWPORT — For the second time in less than a year, a publisher at the Newport Daily Express is out, and the paper is tight-lipped as to the reasons why.
Back in November of 2016, then publisher Ken Wells was fired and Patricia “Trish” Sears of Lowell took over the position.
Sears was the founder and executive director of the Newport Renaissance Corporation and is also well known as a business consultant with Northeast Kingdom Tamarack, Inc., a firm she founded with her husband, Steve Mason.
Back in November, Sears was confident and enthusiastic about her new role, which officially began on December 13. She promised to make the Newport Daily Express a “21st-century multimedia destination, a must read everyday.”
Sears left the paper on Wednesday.
“Less than a year ago, I came to the Newport Daily Express, a paper with a long and storied history, with the intent of helping the organization through what proved to be a challenging time.”
Sears says she worked closely with staff and made significant improvements in the paper by re-focusing efforts to bring the coverage back to the publication’s roots in reporting local news and events, written by local talent.
“It’s been a real pleasure to advance the team’s successes over the past several months and now it’s time to get back to some of the many projects that I had been working on with my husband in our consulting firm, NEKTI Consulting.”
Why not get a group of long term subscribers to assess the paper, point out what readers want and don’t want? Scott Wheeler would be a good one for help; I have written off and on for the paper since the 1950’s and would be happy to give meet with others for suggestions. Improvements have been made but not enough. I’m sure the present staff has ideas, too.
Who will the new editor be? And is it possible the staff need shaking up too? Maybe Christopher Roy could move on to bigger and better things and a new team of reporters brought in.