Titus Workman

The Daily Herald Staff Report

ROANOKE RAPIDS — Titus Workman, a veteran newspaper professional, has been named publisher of The Daily Herald and The Lake Magazine. Wick Communications announced Workman’s appointment. He began his new job Monday.

The 54-year-old new publisher has been the advertising director at The Gaston Gazette in Gastonia for the past seven years.

“I am pleased and excited to lead The Daily Herald,” Workman said. “While this is a very challenging time for newspapers, there are many opportunities to strengthen how we serve advertisers and readers in print and online. The Daily Herald is important to people in the Roanoke Valley and we will strive to make it more so in the months and years ahead.”

Before joining The Gaston Gazette, he held several positions at The Fayetteville Observer including advertising director and general manager of their weekly publications and was advertising director of The Dominion Post in Morgantown, W.Va.

He also worked at the Battle Creek Enquirer in Michigan, Sturgis Journal in Michigan and Herald-Dispatch in Huntington, W. Va. Workman is and has been active in various industry and community organizations including several state press associations, the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association, various chambers of commerce and United Way.

A graduate of Marshall University in Huntington, W. Va., he has been married to Kate for more than 30 years. The couple will make their home in the Roanoke Rapids area. In his free time, Workman enjoys photography, golf and reading.

Ontario, OR - Dee Lee, Payette, stepped into the business manager slot at the Argus Observer officially replacing longtime business manager Judy West.

“We welcome Dee to the Argus Observer family and wish Judy all the best. However, Judy will still play an active, part-time role in our operation and will assist Dee in the transition,” Argus Observer Publisher John Dillon said.

West began her career at the Argus Observer in March 1985. West, who lives in Nyssa with her husband, Al, has two children — Richard and Jolynne — and six grandchildren.

Lee began her tenure at the Argus Observer in June 2009. She lives in Payette with her husband, James, and her two children, Therica, 14, and Cody, 11, along with Jane Wang, 16, a Chinese exchange student.

“Judy West has been a fixture at this newspaper for more than 20 years. That is significant and her honorable service is a testament to her work ethic and dedication,” Dillon said.

After selling the smaller of the two buildings on Kelly Avenue in Half Moon Bay, the Review was able to put a little of that money back into the main building by way of a remodel to make room for the employees who had been working in the second building.

That building was sold in June, but the permitting process to begin the remodel took three months. The project began in September and was completed for the most part by the end of October.

One difficulty in obtaining a permit was due to the fact that the building the company kept, owned by the Review since the 1920s, was a registered historic building. The building had also been built right up to the property line on all sides, so there was no way to build out to get additional space.

Another problem we encountered was that once we began any kind of remodel, we were obligated to make the building compliant to current Americans with Disability Act requirements. This meant including ramp access into the building as well as enlarging the bathroom and doorways into the building and offices.

After going back to the drawing board more times than I’d like to remember, we came up with a plan that utilized existing wasted space in the building and were able to add a lunchroom/conference room, a business office and new ADA-compliant bathroom.

We did this by tearing out the old darkrooms, which hadn’t been used as darkrooms since the late 90s, and also by using the area in the back of the building to enlarge the bathroom and create a small business office.

Because we were on the property line, no windows could be added because of the fire code. We got around this by putting in operational skylights in both the lunchroom and business office.

The old, existing bathroom had to be completely torn out and rebuilt. The foundation had rotted through and the entire bathroom was leaning dangerously due to a sinkhole from a longstanding water leak and drainage problem.

In addition to the repaired bathroom, new lunchroom and business office, other improvements included new bamboo floors, mahogany stain for the walls, wiring (electrical, phone, computer) untapped from the walls and put out of sight, a new heater, lighting, windows and back entry.

While the basic floor plan remains the same, we’ve added five employees and made the whole office more open — no cubicles or private offices besides the lunchroom/conference room, which has full glass doors, like all the other doors in the building.

This openness helps to create an atmosphere where communication becomes a natural flow, and for the most part, the right hand knows what the left hand is doing.

The other big plus is that we have been able to shave $36,000 a year in expenses by downsizing into one building.

Another plus was that because space became a huge consideration for all of us, it forced us to look at all our “stuff” and various procedures and become more efficient. We were forced to start sending electronic tear sheets (something we’ve wanted to do for a long time) just because there was no longer room to store them. This has saved us in postage and manila envelopes, and the transition was virtually seamless.

We also found out we could run Vision Data on our Mac computers, and were able to create space on desks that used to house two different computer systems.

We are working out other storage problems as they come up, and are looking forward to starting out 2010 and a lean, clean newspaper machine.

Debra Godshall, publisher

Wick Communications CEO John Mathew takes a Gatorade bath for the team

In recent years, winning football coaches often get doused by their players with a jug of Gatorade in a sideline celebration. Since the theme for the Wick-wide October 2009 classified advertising blitz was football, it is only fitting that CEO John Mathew agreed to participate in that tradition if the company exceeded its goals on the blitz.

Each of 25 classified sales centers in the company had a goal of gathering 50 points in the blitz that focused on outbound employment sales and growing service directories. If the total effort achieved 1,250 points, then the participants shared in some rewards. And if the results exceeded that figure by more than a third, then Mathew agreed to a Gatorade celebration bath.

The blitz not only brought in new business and enhanced sales techniques, but it resulted in exceeding the Gatorade goal by 39 points. Mathew graciously agreed to the victory celebration at the Sierra Vista (AZ) Herald.

Participants from Tucson newspapers were Monica Akyol, Stephen Myers and Rebecca Rogers. From Sierra Vista were Nancy Bernard, Coco Lucero and Vicki Brenner.