A Newspapering Adventure

Veteran Journalist Smith to Take Over Examiner

The Washington Examiner's new editor, veteran newsman Stephen G. Smith, has one of the more impressive résumés in Washington journalism: top jobs at all three major newsweeklies, writing and editing gigs at big newspapers and glossy magazines, and a turn at a prestigious think tank.

So why, then, is he leaving his latest job as head of the Houston Chronicle's Washington bureau to take over the two-year-old tabloid Examiner, which has a staff of 55 and is given away free?

"I think the Examiner represents a new model of newspapering that really reflects how people want their papers organized, what sort of content they want and how they want [the papers] delivered," Smith said Friday. "I look at life as an adventure. This is an opportunity to do something new and stretch my talent."

At the same time, Smith said he had increasingly thought that his strengths and interests as a journalist no longer aligned with what the Houston paper wanted out of its Washington bureau.

"I've been here a little over two years, and the newspaper landscape has changed dramatically," Smith said. "Now the paper is wanting more enterprise stories, and that's a tricky word. It means different things to different people."

Like all U.S. newspapers, the Chronicle has had tough times, with circulation and advertising declines. Most papers are beefing up their Web sites and rethinking their coverage in an attempt to make themselves more relevant to readers. For many large papers, that has meant de-emphasizing prestige (and expensive) coverage -- such as foreign and Washington bureaus -- in favor of highly local coverage.

Traditionally, the Washington bureaus of large papers such as the Chronicle have covered the classic Washington stories -- the president's State of the Union address, changes in Congress and so on.

But the Chronicle and other regional papers with Washington bureaus are now telling their capital staffs to move away from such pack coverage and write enterprise -- or original -- stories on topics of interest to their readers back home that no other publications are likely to cover.

In other words, goes the thinking, the Chronicle can print a wire-service story about the State of the Union address. But only Chronicle reporters will focus on specific stories about energy, immigration and other important Texas issues.

Such a strategy is radically different from what Smith signed up for when he took over the Chronicle's Washington bureau in November 2004, he agreed Friday. "He was very candid about feeling somewhat uncomfortable with the new directions we're going in," said Chronicle blogger and columnist Julie Mason, describing Smith's explanation to his staff for his departure. "He's more of a traditional newsman."

Mason was the Chronicle's White House reporter until the paper made her a blogger last year, leaving the bureau with no beat reporter to cover the presidency.

At the Examiner, Smith said he plans to add reporters and aggressively cover the White House, Congress and national security.