County Reporter – LNP Media Group (Lancaster)
County Reporter – LNP Media Group (Lancaster)
The LNP Media Group, Inc. family of print and digital publications, part of Steinman Communications, is the biggest and most influential provider of news in Lancaster County, with a history of 225 years of excellence. We are in search of tech-savvy and driven journalists to join our talented team.
Reporters for LNP Media Group exercise strong news judgment and news-gathering capabilities to provide up-to-the-minute information across the company’s digital platforms and insightful, contextual, and analytical journalism for LNP | LancasterOnline. Reporters are expected to develop authoritative sources in the community, collaborate with other LNP and LancasterOnline journalists and identify stories that are compelling to this community news organization’s audience. Reporters are also expected to meet the demands of a growing digital audience by routinely using social media, shooting photographs and video, and understanding how to post their work using a content-management system.
The county reporter, working under the direction of the Government Watchdog team leader, is a proven, experienced journalist who specializes in writing about local county government and how it impacts Lancaster County’s 560,000 residents. The County Reporter is responsible for real-time breaking news coverage of significant county government news, as well as daily and enterprise reporting on the actions of county government and the reactions of different parts of the community. The reporter will also pitch and execute long-term investigative and trend stories.
The person hired for this role will be expected to collaborate with other members of the Watchdog team on story ideas and group reporting projects, and coordinate with LNP’s network of correspondents covering local government meetings. This reporter will lead political reporting on the county level, including political party endorsements, primary and general election campaigns, campaign finance, election activities and Election Day coverage.
The County Government Reporter is expected to:
- Exercise solid news judgment, a sense of urgency and the highest journalistic standards.
- Produce daily as well as mid- and longer-range enterprise stories.
- Regularly curate and aggregate content from other sources and present them with relevance and context for our LancasterOnline audience, with additional commentary and explanation.
- Actively build a social media presence by posting content and engaging with our audience. Look for video and social opportunities for story coverage.
- Use Parse.ly and/or other metrics to gauge how well stories perform with our LancasterOnline audience and, with input from editors, decide how to improve poor performers or stop writing about topics that perform poorly altogether.
- Work with the team to cover elections.
Qualifications:
- Bachelor’s degree in journalism, English, mass communications or related field is required, with a proven knowledge and experience working with current media creation tools and contemporary newsroom systems, producing digital and print content, preferred.
- May be required to meet AP writing style, depending on the publication.
- Solid understanding of news writing, journalistic ethics and story structure.
- Must be able to work nights and weekends as necessary.
- Team player who enjoys a fast-paced work environment.
- Wishes to work in a business environment in which every employee seeks to be great every day.