New Times’ staff riddled by departures

April 17, 2015
Ryan Miller

Ryan Miller

By DANIEL BLACKBURN

New Times, San Luis Obispo’s weekly newspaper, is looking for a few good men… or women, an editor or two, and a reporter.

Ryan Miller, the paper’s executive editor whose primary responsibility was running sister paper Santa Maria Sun, will be leaving after 15 years.

Also, managing editor Ashley Schwellenbach and senior staff writer Colin Rigley are departing together for what the newspaper termed a “new adventure in the wild streets of Seattle.”

“There have been many changes at New Times over the past 30 years,” said owner and publisher Bob Rucker Thursday. “We are looking forward to the future.”

Rucker said he has been receiving many applications seeking the top editor’s job, which has been occupied by only two people since founder Steve Moss died in 2005.

UPDATE: A position in NT’s production department mentioned in an earlier post is no longer available, according to Rucker. And we erred in previously reporting Miller will remain in this area.


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Blackburn’s revenge?


No wonder the NT gang is breaking up. Quality reporting has gone down.

As an example, this week’s Shredder pokes fun at everyone who could/should run for congress, now that Lois is leaving.

Funny thing is Shred sarcastically suggests, “Arroyo Grande Mayor Jim Hill has proven he’s good at sliding into

office without a proven track record, so he might as well make a race of it.”


If reporters had done their job during the fabulously exciting write-in campaign Shred would already know that Jim not only has a track record

in the public sector, as an Oceano CSD board member for over 6 years, he actually had the wherewithal

to run for congress against Lois Capps in 2002 representing the Libertarian party.


A real reporter would have shared this info with Shred, his/her statement wouldn’t look so silly.


Sheesh, come on, Julie… that would have taken AT LEAST a minute or two of internet searching.


You obviously are expecting too much.


Cal Coast provides all the freak show and half truth that I need.


New Times is as dead as the printed news. The only thing keeping the Tribune alive is my


addiction to my coffee routine in the morning and alas, that’s only about 10 minutes if you go cover to cover.


Ten minutes? You might be a slow reader… >.>


Print is dead because it’s time to move on. Exacerbated by the fact that there was a terrible homogenization of editors, reporters, and staff that turned off the majority of readers. The local papers are not alone in this, national print news & periodicals are also hemorrhaging readers.


If I want printed news, I print out Cal Coast News and take it with me. One day, they’ll figure out in-line advertising (a la google) and have a “clip this article” button, add it to a queue, then print them out, quasi-newspaper-layout like. If I knew more HTML5/CSS3 programming, I might just figure it out myself one day.


The New Times has been a complete POS ever since Steve Moss passed away…