VTDigger announced Wednesday that it has hired a trio of experienced editors to help lead its growing newsroom.
Maggie Cassidy, the top editor of the Valley News, will join VTDigger as deputy managing editor, a newly created position. Auditi Guha, a Providence-based journalist who has worked for Rewire.News and several Massachusetts newspapers, will serve as senior editor. And Natalie Williams, the visuals coordinator for the Bangor Daily News, will take on the role of news editor.
VTDigger founder and editor-in-chief Anne Galloway said the new hires will be instrumental in improving the breadth, depth and quality of reporting at the statewide, nonprofit news organization.
“Maggie, Auditi and Natalie are journalism powerhouses in their own right,” Galloway said. “Together, with our already strong editing team, they will undoubtedly take VTDigger to the next level.”
As deputy managing editor, Cassidy will work closely with managing editor Paul Heintz to lead the organization’s daily and investigative news coverage.
Cassidy spent nine years at the West Lebanon, N.H.-based Valley News, which covers the Upper Valley region of Vermont and New Hampshire. There, she served as a news reporter, the paper’s first web editor and, for the past two years, as its top editor. Cassidy, originally from Massachusetts, lives in White River Junction.
Guha will join veteran journalists Jim Welch and Tom Kearney as a senior editor of VTDigger, working closely with writers from pitch to publication.
Most recently, Guha served as northeast regional reporter for Rewire.News, focusing on social justice issues across New England. Prior to that, Guha worked for several Massachusetts newspapers, including the New Bedford Standard-Times, the Somerville Journal and the Cambridge Chronicle. Guha, who has a master’s degree in journalism from Emerson College, got her start reporting for television and print news organizations in Mumbai, India.
As news editor, Williams will oversee VTDigger’s copy-editing operations and work closely with digital editor Mike Dougherty to improve the organization’s visual presentation.
Williams, who grew up in California, moved to the Green Mountain State to attend the University of Vermont. She became editor-in-chief of UVM’s student newspaper, the Vermont Cynic, and interned for Seven Days. Williams subsequently worked as a reporter, photographer and editor for two California publications. For the past three years, she has served as digital editor and then visuals editor of the Bangor Daily News in Maine.
Williams plans to start at VTDigger later this month. Guha and Cassidy expect to do so in April.
Heintz, VTDigger’s managing editor, hailed the hires as a coup for the Montpelier-based news outlet.
“I couldn’t be more thrilled to work with such a talented team of journalists,” he said. “Maggie, Auditi and Natalie will bring to VTDigger tremendous energy, enthusiasm and experience. They’ll help reporters and editors alike up our game and provide Vermonters with the caliber of journalism they have come to expect from this organization.”
VTDigger is one of a handful of nonprofit news organizations in the nation that has developed a promising model of sustainable funding for journalism. The organization has grown from a one-person operation to a 26-member staff over the past 11 years, becoming the newspaper of record for the state of Vermont.
VTDigger is a project of the Vermont Journalism Trust, a 501C3 educational charity dedicated to watchdog reporting that is funded by members, underwriting, grants, e-commerce, events and philanthropic gifts.
