VTDigger has promoted Paul Heintz and Maggie Cassidy to its top newsroom positions, interim executive director Jim Welch announced Thursday. Heintz will serve as editor-in-chief and Cassidy as managing editor.
In those positions, Heintz and Cassidy will lead Vermont’s largest newsroom, which includes 24 reporters, photographers and editors — and serves more than 600,000 readers each month.
The moves are part of a leadership transition that began in May, when VTDigger founder Anne Galloway stepped back from her roles as editor-in-chief of the online news outlet and executive director of its nonprofit parent organization, the Vermont Journalism Trust. She is now editor-at-large.
“My decision to return to Vermont five years ago was due in large part to the opportunity to work alongside Anne, whose vision and accomplishments are unmatched in the world of nonprofit news,” said Welch, a former editor at the Burlington Free Press and USA Today. “Paul and Maggie have demonstrated the same kind of journalistic skills and spirit of innovation that are crucial in leading the kind of talented news team we have here at VTDigger. I’m certain that in their new roles, they will guide us to even greater heights to the benefit of all Vermonters.”
In recent months, the organization’s board of trustees has moved to separate the two leadership positions Galloway held, according to board president John Reilly. The nonprofit will now be led by a chief executive officer who will oversee its business operations and report directly to the board. The editor-in-chief will run the VTDigger newsroom and report to the CEO.
The board is conducting a national search for a CEO and is hoping to fill the position early next year, according to Reilly. At that time, Welch intends to return to his role as senior editor.
Heintz has served as VTDigger’s managing editor since January 2021; Cassidy has been deputy managing editor since April 2021. According to Welch, the two have worked to improve the quality of VTDigger’s journalism, support its employees and ensure that the news organization is serving all Vermonters.
Prior to joining VTDigger, Heintz spent nine years at Seven Days, as a staff writer, political columnist and political editor. He has also worked for the PBS NewsHour, the Brattleboro Reformer and the U.S. House of Representatives. Heintz has been named journalist of the year by the New England Society of News Editors and won the New England Newspaper & Press Association’s First Amendment award for successfully advocating for a media shield law in Vermont.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity to work alongside the talented and hardworking journalists of VTDigger, who every day seek to inform Vermonters and hold the powerful to account,” Heintz said. “I’m honored to succeed Anne Galloway as editor-in-chief and will seek to sustain and grow the reporting powerhouse she built from nothing more than a dream and a whole lot of grit.”
Cassidy worked for the Valley News for nine years — as a reporter, the paper’s first web editor and its top editor. She previously reported for the Boston Globe, Boston Herald and Molokai Dispatch, among other newspapers.
In her new role, Cassidy will oversee the newsroom’s day-to-day operations and will supervise a deputy managing editor and four senior editors.
“I’m impressed every day by my colleagues in the newsroom and across the organization and am honored to continue working alongside them to tell Vermont’s stories,” Cassidy said. “There is so much more great work to do for Vermonters.”