The election period for APSE third vice president is open.
The third vice president will assume office at the concluding meeting of the June conference in Charlotte and serve a two-year term.
Each news organization with circulation under 40,000 has one vote.
To vote, send your choice to Executive Director Jack Berninger at jackapse@aol.com.
The deadline is March 31.
Bios of the candidates – Robert Gagliardi, Emily Horos and Justin Pelletier – are below in alphabetical order.
Robert Gagliardi
News organization: Laramie Boomerang/WyoSports
Background: I have been in sports and newspapers for 23 years. I started at the Wyoming Tribune Eagle in Cheyenne as a sports writer and worked my way up. I was named sports editor in 2002 and have been the senior editor of the collective efforts of the Tribune Eagle and Laramie Boomerang since 2012. As of February of this year, I was told that if I want to keep my job I must move to Laramie and work for the Laramie Boomerang after both papers were sold, going from being family owned to a publishing group called Adams Publishing. However, I will still have roles of overseeing certain operations from both the Tribune Eagle and Laramie Boomerang.
APSE experience: I have been a part of the organization since 2002 and have attended judging and summer conferences regularly since 2009. I ran for APSE third vice president during the last term, and also ran for office in the Northwest Region during the last election.
Objective: To promote and get the word out of how valuable APSE is to sports journalists no matter the size of newspaper they work at. I wouldn’t have gotten this far in my career had it not been for the experiences I gained being a part of APSE. I also would like to help the organization grow in the form of new members and work on ways for current members to share ideas and ways to make things better.
Quotable: “As newspaper staffs and resources shrink throughout the country, it is vital that we — as an organization — find ways to prosper, grow and promote what we stand for and can do to help sports journalists and sports staffs. It doesn’t matter the size of the newspaper or staff, we need to work together to ensure that APSE continues to have a solid foundation and future.”
Emily J. Horos
News organization: American News (Aberdeen, S.D.)
Background: Since August 2015, I have been the sports editor at the American News. During my brief time there, we have expanded our coverage of college football and made a push toward digital platforms and video. Prior to my move to South Dakota, I served as the sports editor at the Cherokee Tribune (Canton, Ga) and a sports writer at the Marietta (Ga.) Daily Journal. Other industry experience includes a stint as a design editor at the Bradenton (Fla.) Herald and as the assistant sports editor at the Daily Journal (Seneca, S.C.). I got my start in journalism as a photographer at a weekly in Easley, S.C., and later established myself as a freelance photographer with clients including The Associated Press, The New York Times and the Orlando Sentinel.
APSE experience: Member of the 2013 APSE Diversity Fellowship class. APSE judge for two years and former vice-chair of the Southeast Region. I will be attending my third summer convention in Charlotte this summer. The APSE and the connections I made through it helped me go from a one-person sports department to overseeing a staff of four in less than two years.
Objective: In order to not only maintain, but increase membership, the APSE needs to find ways to offer more to its members, particularly small papers. Regions need to look for a way to involve more publications and show the value to being a member. As a sports editor at not only a small paper, but a rural one, I have found the importance of getting information to readers that are spread over a large coverage area. I believe small papers need to band together and share the techniques we have learned to make our work more efficient. Digital journalism is a big part of that, but I have learned that even it isn’t a perfect solution. As a representative of small newspapers, I would work to not only bring more publications into the fold, but create a stronger network of members. There are two small colleges in my coverage area with hundreds of athletes. I know there are sports editors at papers around the country that would like the features we have produced on some of these student-athletes. I would like to build a network to connect these two pieces so everyone, especially the readers, can get more.
Quotable: “You can’t win if you don’t play the game.”
Justin Pelletier
News organization: Sun Journal (Lewiston, Maine)
Background: I am proud to be in a very rare group of people who have ascended to leadership at a media outlet with which they’ve grown up. A native of Lewiston, I attended and graduated from Boston University with a degree in journalism, having followed both a print and a broadcast track of study. I met my wife of nearly nine years on the job at the Sun Journal, where I began working less than one year after graduating college. Together we have a home and twin daughters who are more and more amazing every day.
At work, I have run the gamut from beat writer to features writer and columnist, ascending to an assistant sports editors’ role in 2007, and to sports editor in 2012. In early 2016, I was named Managing Editor/Nights, a role that keeps me in charge of our sports operation while expanding my role in other facets of the newsroom, including digital and copy desk duties.
APSE experience: Our department has been a member off and on for many years. Since 2012, I have attended nearly every regional meeting we’ve had in the Northeast, and have been to four consecutive judging conferences and three consecutive summer conferences beginning in 2013. The streak will continue in Charlotte, and for the foreseeable future. Though in recent years the trip has become almost entirely self-financed, it has been important for me, and for our department, to continue being active within the organization.
The Sun Journal sports department won seven top-10 awards for our work in 2015, including our third consecutive top-10 in projects. Our sections have been honored in daily or Sunday section categories multiple times in recent years, as well.
Objective: The third VP role for APSE is important for departments like ours. There is so much tangible benefit to us as small shops to be a part of a fraternity that marries the interests of outlets of all sizes. As a member of the board, one of my goals would be to find creative ways for more small outlets to be as active as I have been without having to dip deeply into their own pockets. Membership decline in the past few years has almost been taken as an inevitability, but at some point, it needs to stop. We need to make our base of small outlets feel like, A) it matters, B) it is welcome, and C) it is accessible. Region meetings are a big part of that, but it should also be incumbent on region chairs to reach out to small papers within their regions, and the leadership in the regions should work to make those meetings as accessible to as many smaller outlets as possible.
Quotable: “The news gathering and disseminating business is not going away. It’s changing, evolving as all things do over time. It’s up to our outlets, large and small, to accept that things are changing and be part of that innovation moving forward, lest we be left behind. Smaller outlets have more of an opportunity to try new things, and should exercise that opportunity at every turn.”
