NYT Struts And Puffs About Rehiring Some Environment Reporters After Gutting Department
It’s hard to dispute the public’s dismay over climate change. When hundreds of thousands of people take to the Manhattan streets, as they did in the People’s Climate March last month, something big is clearly happening. But a year ago, the signs weren’t particularly good for coverage of the environment in The New York Times.
A special group (or “pod”) of reporters who had that expertise had been disbanded, and the Green blog had been discontinued. I wrote about it several times, including a column that demonstrated that the amount and quality of coverage had declined. Now, I’m glad to report, things are looking up again. Since the survival of the planet ranks pretty high on my list of what matters, it seems worth noting here exactly what’s happening and why.
The most notable change is the addition of some heavy-hitting reporters to a team with a newly appointed editor, Adam Bryant. The reporters include John Schwartz, David Kocieniewski and Henry Fountain. Erica Goode, who founded the original environmental team in 2009 and was its editor for two years, will be a science writer at large, reporting to Mr. Bryant. They join Justin Gillis and Michael Wines in New York and Coral Davenport in Washington, as well as Felicity Barringer on the West Coast. In addition, James Gorman has been contributing a multimedia element with his Science Take videos.
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The Times’s renewed — and in fact, increased — commitment is a most welcome development. I hope that the coverage will be approached with the sense of urgency that this dire situation demands.
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http://publiceditor.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/10/07/like-sea-level-times-environmental-coverage-on-the-rise/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_php=true&_type=blogs&_php=true&_type=blogs&partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=2