Newspaper jobs in Northern Kentucky

Hello, everyone. Longtime lurker (two years or thereabouts), first-time poster. Love love LOVE this site.
Anyway, I wasn't sure if I should post this on the Jobs board or this one, but I went for this one since the Jobs board seems more or less to be about specific openings.

But I digress. My SO has a job opportunity, a well-paying one, in Lexington. She hasn't been offered yet but feels pretty good about it and thinks it's time I got on the ball trying to find something for myself. I know about the Herald-Leader, but I'm also looking for information about other papers, both dailies and weeklies, in the Lexington-Frankfort area. Danville, Richmond, Nicholasville, Georgetown --- anything.

For background, I'm a longtime journalist (15 years-plus or so) and I've spent the vast majority of my time as a sports copy editor and page designer, although I've also been a news page designer and copy editor, the sports editor of a small-town daily in Texas and currently the news editor of a weekly in Texas. I've also spent the last four years of my career both reporting and page designing.

I've written down some contact information about papers in the area but otherwise know nothing, like good places to work for and places I should avoid. I assume the pay will probably be so-so at best at all except the Leader, but I would appreciate any input. I figure that, given all the experience on this board, a few people probably are familiar with the area or know someone who is.

Thanks, everyone!

 

Paxton is based in Paducah, Ky. There's a whole thread on the journalism board about their merit.

 

Hank:

Thanks for the quick reply. Don't worry, I'm well aware of the plague that is Paxton, and I don't think they own any papers in the area we're looking in. At least, they better not.

 

Daily papers in Lexington (obviously), Richmond, Frankfort, Danville and Winchester. Of those, I can say nice things about only Lexington and Danville (the latter is serious prep football country, with two of the state's powerhouses within the county boundaries). The Richmond Register (a PM that usually is on the streets by lunch) is okay with good facilities, but it's CNHI.

Weekly paper in Nicholasville, semi-weekly in Georgetown. Nothing pleasant to say about the chain that owns the Georgetown paper at all; avoid, avoid, avoid. The Nicholasville paper is okay for a weekly.

 

The Richmond paper is fine, but it does have a bit of a "fly-by-night" operations way about it. Had a friend who worked there, never really felt like he knew what was going on. It just seemed to be kind of a patchwork operation.

Lexington is a good job, obviously, and Danville is a good paper for its size. 2much is right about the prep football. Winchester is death (also had a friend who worked there, hated every second). I've never known anyone who worked in Frankfort, at least not personally.

The weekly in Nicholasville is up and down. Some weeks it doesn't suck so bad, some weeks I'm embarrassed to see it. There are weeklies all around that area, Harrodsburg, Lancaster, etc. There were two papers in Pulaski County, about an hour and a half from Lexington...but I'm guessing that might be too much. I don't know if it's down to one now or not.

Anyway, try contacting the Kentucky Press Association and see if they can offer any assistance.

 

Thanks for the great advice, everyone. Keep it coming!
I worked for a CNHI paper in Texas a couple of years back, so I know what to expect from that company. Sad to hear that Richmond is a PM, unless it's one of those PMs that hits the streets in the afternoon put prints according to an AM schedule, like my aforementioned CNHI paper.

Lexington is the best, so I will shoot for that, but obviously I need to keep my options open. Danville sounds promising, but I don't know if anyone has any openings. I've monitored the Kentucky Press Association site daily, and only the paper in Shelbyville seems to be close enough for us (the Sentinel-News needs an editor), and that will only work if we decide to live in say, Frankfort, and split the difference between Shelbyville and Lexington. Otherwise, the distance is too great.

I suppose I will just shoot some blind resumes their way just so they can have them on file. Like I said, I have no idea if we're moving or not, but the signs are promising.

 

This will get laughed at, but I had a professor who called Kentucky "God's country" and not in the Bill O'Reilly way. It truly is a great place and you are centrally located to plenty of hot spots within a short drive if you live in central Kentucky.
First of all, are you looking at sports or any reporting job in general?
As for the papers, the Jessamine Journal (the Nich Vegas weekly) looks a lot better than it did in the past and they have a new editor after the longtime editor, who once got in a shouting match with Mitch McConnell in a parking lot, left for Winchester.
Speaking of Winchester, it's an under 10K paper that is so-so at best. Danville is the same size and does a far better job, not to mention is a better town with NAIA Centre College.
Richmond could be better. But they have EKU, which the Lexington paper only touches on.
Elizabethtown is a solid paper with good leadership. I'd hit them up.
Northern Kentucky is just a bunch of scattered small papers and the soon-to-be-dead Kentucky/Cincinnati Post. NKY needs a true voice and the Enquirer will not cut it.
But Lexington and Louisville have experienced many hiring freezes over the past year (and then some), and the job market isn't all that good.
What else is new?

 

With your copy editing and page design experience, I would be willing to bet you'll find work sooner than later. But I know nothing of newspapers in northern Kentucky, so I have nothing more to add.

Good luck.

 

I was about to comment on these papers in Winchester, Danville, Lexington, Pulaski County and Richmond until I realized you people aren't talking about Virginia. Friend worked at Danville, and friend was fine with the experience, and friend is at a bigger paper now. Outside of that, the only other advice I have is to bring a ziploc bag for the excess cheese that comes when you hit the Skyline, home of chili-flavored cheese.

 

Dwayne,

I'll second covert's assessment of Elizabethtown. Great place with a lot of veterans.

HOWEVER, E'town is at least a good 75 minutes from Lexington, and the connector highway (Blue Grass Parkway) can be desolate. Plus, there are very few cities between Lex and E'town. Lawrenceburg might be the best place in between -- that's reasonably drivable between both cities.

Had friends work for Richmond and Danville. Those might be your best options, but Frankfort usually has more openings.

Shelbyville is a solid paper for being a twice (or thrice) weekly. It's also the HQ for Landmark Comunity Newspapers Inc. LCNI manages most of the community papers in the area, including E'town. Bardstown's Kentucky Standard (another twice/thrice) is another decent market and paper, again owned by LCNI.

With the way Georgetown and Scott County are growing, I'm surprised it doesn't have a daily paper. Maybe that day will come soon.

Something else to consider, since Lexington is the Horse Capital of the World (or so they say), there are a lot of trade magazines and pubs related to the industry. In addition, Host Communications is based in Lexington, and they're always looking for editors.

Best of luck.

 

Shelbyville is less than an hour's drive from Lexington. For someone used to motoring across Texas, I wouldn't think that would be a big deal.

 

I can get from Shelbyville to Lexington in under 40 minutes.

Frankfort is pretty much the median between them. If you don't want to live there, you can move to what I believe will be Kentucky's next great metropolis: Waddy-Peytona.