BOISE STATE PUBLIC RADIO
Gemma Gaudette, on-air host of Idaho Matters on Boise State Public Radio, comes on board from the University of Idaho. Richard Copeland, senior producer of Idaho Matters on Boise State Public Radio, joins the staff from WITF, a public media organization in central Pennsylvania.
Summer interns are Will Reid of Yale University and Blake Simony of Boise State.
EAST IDAHO NEWS
Rett Nelson has been promoted to an editor/reporter. The publication also recently learned that EastIdahoNews.com has won a National Edward R. Murrow award, and staffers will be going to New York City in October to receive the award.
KIVI-TV
KIVI has a new news director: J Bates. Also new are Content Manager AM Mary Beth Dickson and Content Manager PM Mike Sharp. KIVI also has three new multi-media journalists: McKenna King, Madeline White, and Jessica Taylor.
KTVB-TV
Kate Morris has been promoted to President and General Manager of KTVB after leading the news team as Executive News Director for 7 years. Lisa Chavez replaces Kate Morris as the Director of Content at KTVB.
KTVB also welcomes Jessica Mullins as Digital Managing Editor. Jessica is a Boise native who has been a journalist in the San Francisco Bay Area for nearly 10 years. Most recently she’s served as the senior homepage editor at the San Francisco Chronicle’s SFGate.com.
KTVB welcomes new reporter Shirah Matsuzawa. Shirah comes from Los Angeles, where she most recently worked as a content producer for NBC Universal.
Xanti Alcelay was promoted to Director of Strategy and Innovation. And Dean Johnson, former KTVB reporter, has joined the Idaho Department of Housing and Finance working in communications.
IDAHO PRESS
New staffers include Betsy Russell, who joined the Idaho Press as the new Boise bureau chief for the Press and Adams Publishing Group after nearly 27 years with The Spokesman-Review. Brian Myrick is the new photo editor; he previously was photo editor of the Ellensberg, Wash. Daily Record. Jeanne Huff, formerly with the Idaho Business Review, is the new community engagement editor for the Press.
Xavier Ward is the new Ada County reporter; he previously was a reporter for the Highland Park Landmark in suburban Chicago. New Boise city hall reporter Margaret Carmel formerly was a reporter for the News & Advance in Lynchburg, Va. And new Ada County cops and courts reporter Tommy Simmons joins the press from the Greeley Tribune in Greeley, Colo.
Kyle Pfannenstiel is completing a summer internship as the night digital reporter for the Press; he will return to the University of Idaho. Meanwhile, recent U of I graduate Savannah Cardon joins the Press as the new Caldwell city reporter.
And on July 23, the Idaho Press will welcome a new sports editor: Greg Lee, who has worked as a sports reporter for 35 years for The Spokesman-Review in Coeur d’Alene. Also on July 23, Riley Bunch will start as the new night digital reporter for the Press; Riley is a recent graduate of Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications.
IDAHO STATESMAN
Longtime environmental reporter Rocky Barker has retired. Maria La Ganga, who formerly was freelancing, is a new reporter on the Boise growth beat. Kelsey Grey is a new video producer/videographer; Kelsey previously was a video fellow at the Fresno Bee.
Rebecca Poynter is the Statesman’s new publisher. She joined the Statesman from Gannett Mid-Michigan where she was President of the Lansing State Journal, with additional oversight for Port Huron Times Herald, Battle Creek Enquirer, Livingston Daily Press & Argus and the Observer & Eccentric.
The Statesman has three summer interns: Meiying Wu is a photographer/videographer who just received her degree from the University of Missouri School of Journalism; she will continue on to graduate school in Berkeley, California in the fall. Kevin Davenport, an experimental physics Ph.D. candidate at the University of Utah, joins the Statesman as a science intern through a Mass Media Science and Engineering Fellowship. He’ll be writing about drought, flooding, fires, the environment and climate change. Brandon Rasmussen is a general assignment reporter. He will be a senior at Boise State University in the English Writing Major program and he was the Editor-in-Chief for The Arbiter this past year.
