Here's an excerpt of the note from Assistant Managing Editor Henry Fuhrmann to the staff,  announcing a national headline award. (As an earlier post on the readers' rep journal explained, headlines online sometimes differ from those in print, so not all stories linked below carry the award-winning headlines.)

Colleagues:

The Times has won the headline writers of the year award from the American Copy Editors Society. The judges recognized our team entry for “consistently excellent heads in tight counts, heads that drew readers in and made them want to read the story.”

Further: “Their readouts did more than inform; they continued the brightness that made the stories under them appealing.”

A list of the editors and their headlines follows (here's a link to see the work in published form).

Again, we offer our thanks and congratulations to all involved:

Following is the memo to staff from National Editor Roger Smith:

I’m delighted to announce that Tina Susman has joined the National staff in New York. For the past 2 1/2  years Tina has been reporting from The Times' Baghdad bureau, where she built on her already impressive record as a foreign correspondent.  Prior to joining The Times, Tina spent eight years at Newsday, serving as South Africa correspondent from 1998-2001 and as a national and international correspondent based in New York after that.  She was AP’s West Africa correspondent from 1994-98 and South Africa correspondent and news editor from 1990-94.  During that stint she was kidnapped while on assignment in Mogadishu by Somali gunmen and held captive for 20 days until being freed unharmed.  She has covered the war in Iraq, as well as conflicts throughout Africa, and the end of apartheid in South Africa. 

Tina was born in Orange and raised in Oakland, where she was co-editor of her high school paper with Mark Barabak. She is a graduate of San Diego State University. 

Tina is ideally suited to take on all the great stories that originate in New York and the Northeast. She goes places others prefer to avoid, finds tales that would otherwise not be told, and tells them with a
verve that others can only envy.

Roger Smith
National editor

Here's the announcement to staff from Editor Russ Stanton:

Colleagues:
 
“Mexico Under Siege,” our innovative and deeply reported chronicle of the narco-violence afflicting our southern neighbor and our own border region, has collected a fresh batch of honors.
 
The Overseas Press Club of America last night bestowed its prestigious Hal Boyle Award for newspaper reporting to “Mexico Under Siege,” along with a special citation for exceptional online coverage of international affairs.
 
“Mexico” has also snared a Sigma Delta Chi Award for online reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists.
 
This remarkable multimedia project, which features video, interactive graphics and a Q&A blog on which staffers have answered readers’ questions in English and Spanish, previously won the web reporting prize in the Scripps Howard National Journalism competition.
 
It’s rare to see a piece of journalism lauded for both print and online excellence, and it’s a testament to the strides we’ve made toward becoming a multi-platform newsroom. It's also  time to salute those responsible for this terrific project.
 
--Editing. Asst. California Editor Geoff Mohan has directed the series from the outset, with daily editing help from the Foreign and Metro desks.
--Reporting. Tracy Wilkinson and Ken Ellingwood in our Mexico City bureau, Rich Marosi in San Diego and Sam Quinones in Los Angeles have been the primary writers of the series; at least 10 other staffers have contributed stories to the effort.
--latimes.com/Database team. Sean Connelley, Stephanie Ferrell, Michael McGehee, Katy Newton and Ben Welsh developed the outstanding interactive package.
--Photo/video. Don Bartletti has been the primary photographer on the project and Deborah Bonello handled video, with editing assistance from Alan Hagman (online) , Mary Cooney (print) and Scott Anger (video).
--Graphics. Tom Reinken, Lorena Iniguez, Raul Ranoa and Thomas Lauder produced the informational graphics for both print and online.
--Design.  Derek Simmons and Kelli Sullivan have overseen the design efforts.
--Copy desk. Our crack troops have gang-tackled this one, with Arnold Paradise leading the charge.
You can find this wonderful piece of journalism at www.latimes.com/siege.

In addition, the Pulitzer Prize-winning “Big Burn” series on wildfires won a Sigma Delta Chi Award for informational graphics. The award recognizes the hand-drawn illustrations, maps and other graphics that gave the series such a distinctive look and helped makes its wealth of detail about firefighting tactics and costs accessible to readers.
 
Congratulations to everyone.
 
Russ Stanton
Editor

Here's the memo to the staff from Deputy National Editor Ashley Dunn:

Steve Padilla has joined the National desk as an assistant National editor.

Steve joined the paper 22 years ago as the night cop reporter in the Valley Edition. In three years he was named an assistant city editor and has been editing ever since. Steve is known for his skill at editing narratives, and reporters throughout the building ask him to offer guidance on their stories.

Steve was the managing editor of the Valley Edition when it spearheaded the paper’s Pulitzer-winning coverage of the botched North Hollywood bank robbery in 1997. He was part of the editing team that handled the 2000 presidential election and, as a member of the Metro desk for the past eight years, edited a variety of subjects, including higher education and religion. For nearly two years he has overseen the paper’s military obituaries and was part of the team that created the California War Dead Database. This winter he helped plan web and broadsheet coverage of Barack Obama’s inauguration and edited a special section on presidential inaugurations.

Although he admits to being a bit of a technophobe, Steve has embraced the web. He helped launch the L.A. Now and L.A. Unleashed blogs and works with Andrew Malcolm on Top of The Ticket. He even live-blogged a recent presidential press conference.

Steve is a local product, originally from Alhambra and a graduate of USC, where he was editor of the Daily Trojan. Before joining The Times, he was a reporter with the San Diego Union and an editor with Hispanic Link Weekly Report, a newsletter on Latino affairs. On the non-journalistic front, he’s a musician -- a trained tenor -- and sometimes available for weddings.

Update: As of Wednesday morning, April 22, the readers' representative office has been able to receive e-mails. The address: readers.rep@latimes.com.]

The Readers' Rep mailbox is experiencing technical difficulties. If you send us an e-mail it may bounce back. We hope to resolve the situation soon.

In the meantime, please contact us by phone at (877) 554-4000, by fax at (213) 237-3535 or by mail to 202 W. 1st Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012.

Thank you!

Here is the memo sent to staff from John Corrigan, Business editor:

I’m very pleased to report that David Sarno is joining the Business staff as a technology reporter.
 
No doubt you’ve seen David’s fine work on the ever-popular tech blog and on the Calendar cover, where he wrote the weekly Web Scout column.  David will continue to be one of the mainstay contributors to the tech blog, but he’ll also aim to tell longer stories that will be of wide appeal in print as well.

Among the subjects he'll mine for news and features are the L.A. tech scene, Internet privacy and security, Twitter and the technologies that bind and divide old- and new-media companies.

David grew up surfing the waves off Hermosa Beach and has an eclectic resume, serving as associate editor with the Huffington Post, a writing intern on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and an engineering intern at Sun Microsystems.

David, who has a B.A. in computer science from Yale, and a master’s in fiction writing from the University of Iowa, will report to technology editor Chris Gaither. Please join me in giving him a warm welcome to Biz.

Updated, 11 a.m. Friday: The number of e-mails received on the subject has exceeded 80.

------------------------------

More than 30 e-mails have been received in reaction to the front-page advertisement -- written as if it were  a news story -- in  today's  Los Angeles Times. The word "advertisement" appeared under the NBC logo, but readers wrote angry  notes. In addition to e-mails, some two dozen readers have called with similar sentiments.  Here are some excerpts:

Are you kidding me? When will those who run our paper stop insulting their readers' intelligence and our commitment to its survival? Seeing that front page ad was not shocking. If you want to sell advertising on the front page -- great, do it! But trying to spin it as a story? Where are the journalistic standards?

This paper has slowly withered in size and might and insight. Great columnists are gone and the ones remaining write their columns with such fear of their own futures that I feel such empathy.

Clearly "out of the box" thinking is important to the survival of the newspaper, but creative thinking that does not harm the paper's reputation. Unfortunately, I think this ship sailed a while back.

One step closer to canceling the subscription ... and there aren't many steps left.

What a way to alienate those few remaining loyalists.

Joey Shanley

- - - - - -

The ongoing deterioration of a once-great newspaper reached a new low this morning. Unbelievable!

Peter F. McAndrews
Santa Monica

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I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw the Times' front page on Thursday, April 9. There must have been nearly 20% of the front page dedicated to advertising! It is sad to see a fine newspaper stoop to such lows, and I hope this doesn't continue.

David Holmes
Buena Park

- - - - - -

I am completely outraged that the L.A. Times, formerly one of the premier newspapers of the world, would finally be brought down so low as to accept advertising on a significant portion of its front page. I hope the Tribune Co. got a ton of money for this vile  and image-destroying move -- they will need it as the Times loses still more circulation. I am not going to continue my subscription, as there appears to be less and less room for information, and more  and more for infomercials.

Suzanne Schechter
Oxnard   

- - - - - -

Today's issue shows just how low the L.A. Times has sunk!  A very amateurish appearing ad on the front page!  The Times has proven itself to no longer be a newspaper but a shill for whatever company pays the most. I might as well switch my subscription to the Daily News.

R. L. Giannangeli
North Hollywood
   

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Every time I think this paper can't get any worse, I'm unpleasantly surprised. The massive ad taking up valuable column space on the front page of Thursday's paper has finally convinced me to cancel my subscription. The L.A. Times has gotten so pathetic, I'm forced to get my news elsewhere.

Elizabeth Babor
La Crescenta

- - - - - -

I was born and raised in Los Angeles. I literally learned to read my first words from your paper.  But the great glory days are gone. It was one thing to have ads on the bottom of the front page, which are now larger than the actual headlines. But to show a faux news item ...

Here's the announcement from Alice Short, assistant managing editor, Features:

After many years of helping the editors of this paper manage the editorial staff, Susan Denley is moving back into the newsroom. Susan will join the second-floor features team as associate features editor, starting April 13.

She will assist in identifying and editing potential A-1 stories, develop a greater range of lifestyle coverage, take over features’ reverse-publishing initiative and provide backup assistance to the editors of the weekly sections.

Susan will continue to coordinate staff development programs for editorial, and she will serve as a special advisor to Russ Stanton.

Before heading up Editorial Hiring and Development, Susan had a wealth of journalism experience, in hard news and features, as a reporter, editor and section head. At various times her portfolio ranged from government, politics and news investigations to debutante balls, lifestyle features and home decorating columns.

Susan joined the Times in 1988 as assistant editor of the old Westside suburban section. A year later she became deputy to the suburban editor, helping edit and manage the 100-person suburban staff as they produced six suburban sections (and, for a brief time, the Valley edition). In 1993, she was named Hiring and Development Editor.

During her tenure, H&D organized various staff development programs, launched a national award- winning student journalism program, built up the Metpro training program, and helped develop the curriculum for our comprehensive multimedia training program. Susan worked directly with six different editors of this paper on a variety of initiatives related to the development of one of the nation’s strongest news-gathering staffs.

Before coming to the Times, Susan worked for the Orange County Register, the St. Petersburg Times and the Tampa Times.

Susan will report to me.

Alice Short
Assistant managing editor, Features

Below is the memo from Health/Science Editor Tami Dennis announcing the move :

John Johnson, who has been covering space and physics on the National Desk, is joining the larger health/science team effective immediately.

John, who has been at the Times 21 years, began his career here in the former Valley edition.  He covered the porn industry and wrote the first story (with former Times’ reporter Ron Soble) pointing the finger at the Menendez brothers in their parents’ slayings. He also wrote a book about the killings that was made into a TV movie.  He later worked as city editor in the Ventura edition before becoming a state reporter, assigned to cover the Central California coast. Five years ago, he took on the space and physics beat, covering the space shuttle program, JPL and Caltech. In his recent reporting, he’s traveled to Switzerland to write about the Large Hadron Collider, Louisiana to write about gravity wave detectors and the mountains of New Mexico to write about the largest star survey in history.

 Before coming to the Times, he worked in McClatchy Newspapers’ Washington bureau (during the Reagan years) and as an environmental reporter at the Sacramento Bee.

John’s  hobbies include collecting old vinyl R-and-B records, which he says he boorishly pulls out for visitors when he’s had too much scotch. He has a son who attends law school at Notre Dame.

---Tami Dennis, Health/Science Editor

Here's the memo sent to staff by Editor Russ Stanton:

Colleagues:

As the media landscape continues to shift, we are seizing the opportunity to expand The Times to a different audience with a new multimedia editorial product called Brand X (thisisbrandx.com).  [*Update: That website will be open for business in the next few weeks, when publication of the tabloid begins.]

In a few weeks, the street boxes currently occupied by Metromix will offer a new weekly tabloid created by the combined efforts of the former Metromix staff, latimes.com and our newsroom.  Online, BrandX will take blog form and will evolve and exist apart from latimes.com with its own identity and voice.

Brand X is designed to be a community, aimed at younger, social-networking readers who are interested in culture, technology, entertainment, food, events, volunteering, style and the outdoors. Reader input and participation will be part of the mix, as will features, quick-hit items, reviews and listings.

Brand X will include Times coverage of must-see concerts, exhibitions and events in Southern California.  We'll reverse-publish many of our latimes.com blog posts, use Times-generated articles and photos, and create original content that can go back into the main paper. It's content sharing on an extremely local level and will bring our great work to an audience that does not currently see it.

Metromix editor Deborah Vankin, formerly of L.A. Weekly and Variety, will be the editor of Brand X, and report to Dean Kuipers, who counts the launch of The Guide in his 19-plus years in journalism. Their combined staffs -- which soon will be together on the second floor -- will continue to maintain the LA Metromix website, as well as fuel latimes.com’s listings, daily print contributions and numerous blogs. The photo, design and copy desks will assume production duties for the tab.

Brand X's success relies on the talents of our newsroom, and I’m looking forward to seeing where we can take this, with your continued supply of smart ideas and execution.

Russ Stanton
Editor

Below is the memo from Editor Russ Stanton and Foreign Editor Bruce Wallace on the change.

Colleagues:

The Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune are unifying their foreign reporting operations to provide Tribune papers and websites with the enterprising overseas coverage that has brought such distinction to both news organizations.

Both have great traditions of reporting from abroad. The Chicago Tribune began sending correspondents into the field at the turn of the 20th century and has been home to such fabled correspondents as Wilfred Barber and William Shirer. Under publisher Otis Chandler, the Los Angeles Times built a network of foreign correspondents that was at the forefront of the paper’s commitment to excellence, producing talented reporters such as David Lamb and Michael Parks.

The new Tribune foreign operation will uphold that great legacy.

The joint operation will be run from Los Angeles, where the bulk of the editing staff is currently based, in consultation with editors in Chicago and across the Tribune family. The staff will consist of L.A. Times and Chicago Tribune correspondents, strategically based around the world, who will emphasize original reporting delivered in a unique voice for print and online audiences. Their mix of daily news and features will meet our readers’ expectations for sophisticated reporting and writing from outside the United States.

The foreign report will continue to be distributed on the L.A. Times-Washington Post News Service and to the Tribune family of papers and websites in a daily, ready-to-publish World and Nation report produced in Chicago. Our stories and reports will reach millions more digitally, be it online, via mobile devices or eEdition delivery.

We are proud of the many brave and talented correspondents upon whose shoulders we stand. Several generations of foreign correspondents from The Times and Tribune have covered wars and upheaval, including Africa in the 1930s, Vietnam and the horrors of 21st century Baghdad. They have reported through global economic depressions and have chronicled political and social changes from the capitals of Europe to villages in Asia. The current global turmoil demands that we continue to provide lively journalism that enlightens and entertains existing readers and new audiences alike. The new Tribune foreign operation will meet that challenge.

Russ Stanton
Editor

Bruce Wallace
Foreign Editor

Here's the memo to the staff from Business editor John Corrigan:

Colleagues,

I'm thrilled to announce that veteran Times reporter Hugo  Martín  will be joining our team to cover a key industry: tourism.

In his nearly 22 years at The Times, Hugo has seen action throughout the Southland, including stints in Metro and the Valley, Orange County, Ventura County and Inland Empire editions. His assignments have included local politics, Los Angeles City Hall and transportation.

Hugo was also part of the Metro staff that won Pulitzer Prizes for covering the '92 Los Angeles riots, the 1994 Northridge earthquake and the North Hollywood bank shootout.

In 2005, Hugo joined the staff of the Outdoor section. After it closed, Hugo transferred to Travel, where he distinguished himself on the outdoor recreation beat.

A graduate of Pomona College, Hugo started with The Times as a member of the Minority Editorial Training Program. He authored a children's book, "Pablo's Christmas," which was recently published as a stage play. He is married to Times "Cause Celeb" columnist Tina Daunt. They live in Pasadena with their daughter Isabella, two cats and a very old dog.

Hugo will work with Pat McMahon. Please join me in welcoming him to our team.

Recent tales of death and (use of our) taxes hit readers hard: Thomas Curwen's profile of one 90-year-old man contemplating his fate evoked responses from more than 350 readers. And Michael Rothfeld's report on how state officials "have made free use of government expense accounts with little oversight" brought plaudits from readers -- and change from state leaders.

In the midst of widely publicized cuts in the newspaper industry, it's not surprising that many of the readers who took time to praise graceful writing and investigations into uses and misuses of power also talked of the fate of news organizations and The Times.

"Remarkable article on Edwin Shneidman," wrote Telle Riikonen of Santa Barbara of the Feb. 28 Column One. "I read it twice. The second time was just to enjoy the language and the feeling of the man and his long life as conveyed by your eye for detail in his house. I take serious journalism very seriously and lament the disappearance of long, well-written features and profiles in newspapers."

For Rothfeld's March 1 piece came this e-mail from Fernanda Benevides of Laguna Niguel: "I love the Los Angeles Times and your exposés.... Thank you for your article and the courage to inform the public of what really these questionable characters are doing."

Here's the memo from Editor Russ Stanton announcing the California editor's move to the masthead.

Colleagues:

David Lauter, California editor for the last year and a half, will join our masthead as an assistant managing editor, effective today.

This appointment reflects David's skilled leadership of our largest and most important news-gathering operation, the local and California report. He has strengthened key beats and encouraged reporters and editors to pursue an ambitious agenda. And he has worked to maintain the high quality of our print report while reorganizing the department to maximize our reach on the Web, becoming a strong advocate for the importance of innovative online journalism. During his tenure, the Metro staff has become a leader in moving us into 24-hour online coverage and has shown that we can pursue excellence in our coverage while greatly expanding our Web traffic. 

David is well known to most of you: In his almost 22 years at The Times, he has worked with the National, Foreign and Metro desks. He started in our Washington bureau in 1987 and covered the White House under George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. He covered two presidential campaigns and directed the reporting of a third. In eight years as a reporter, David had more than 700 A1 bylines, a total that's hard to beat.

As an editor, David oversaw our coverage of the California gubernatorial recall election in 2003 and played a central role in guiding our work on the devastating wildfires that year, for which The Times won a Pulitzer Prize. As deputy foreign editor in 2006 and 2007, he helped guide our coverage of Iraq during some of the most difficult days for our Baghdad bureau.

Please join me in congratulating David on this well-deserved promotion.

Russ Stanton
Editor

Below is the note from Editor Russ Stanton announcing the appointment.

Colleagues:

Henry Fuhrmann is being promoted to assistant managing editor in charge of copy desks, standards and the library, effective immediately.

Henry, The Times' first senior copy chief for the Web, is an extraordinarily versatile editor with first-rate management skills and the highest editing standards. He has earned well-deserved praise for helping shape our strategy for posting stories and photos to the Web quickly and efficiently while maintaining the accuracy and fairness that are the hallmarks of The Times' report. He worked quickly to help improve headline writing on the Web, thereby significantly improving search for users; our increasing web traffic is in part due to what he and the entire copy editing team have accomplished.

Here's the memo from Editor Russ Stanton about honors from Scripps Howard:

   Colleagues:

   It’s a pleasure to announce that we have been honored with three first-place awards in the annual Scripps Howard National Journalism contest.

   The Times staff took the Web reporting prize for “Mexico Under Siege.” This multimedia project, which features photo galleries, videos, a searchable archive of stories, an interactive map and a Q&A blog, is a great example of what we can achieve when we collaborate across departments and put our finest work out there in all platforms. If you haven’t seen the presentation, go to latimes.com/siege.

   The Scripps Howard judges awarded Michael Robinson Chavez the photojournalism prize for a portfolio of images from around the world. The judges cited Michael’s “ability to work intimately and analytically in unfamiliar cultures and situations” in Mumbai, Nepal, Mexico, the rural U.S. and the former Soviet republic of Georgia. Don Bartletti was a finalist in the same category for pictures chronicling the ordeal of Mexican immigrants who braved wildfires to cross the border.

   Our third winner was David Willman, in the Washington reporting category, for his articles on the flawed federal investigation into the 2001 anthrax attacks.* [Updated: This post earlier said incorrectly that the anthrax attacks for which Willman's reporting was honored were in 2002.]

     A complete list of winners and finalists is here.

     Congratulations to everyone.

Russ Stanton
Editor

Carl E. Ossipoff of Newport Beach wrote, "8,000 people show up to a 'Tax Revolt' rally in Fullerton and the L.A. Times fails to cover it because it's not newsworthy? Maybe if you covered the things important to the folks in the Southland, you'd sell more papers."

So said a number of others who wrote over the weekend asking why there was no story on a rally promoted by KFI-AM talk-show hosts to protest recent proposed tax increases. The rally drew (depending on who's counting) 3,000 to 15,000 people.

The Times noted the event with a short post on the L.A. Now blog on March 8. The rally was covered by the Orange County Register and San Gabriel Valley Tribune (which noted: "The radio station reported as many as 15,000 people attended, but a Fullerton police sergeant estimated 3,000 to 8,000 people were there").

Other events with similar numbers don't always get stories; an earlier post on this journal gave the thinking on that last year.

California Editor David Lauter wrote back to scores who asked about the event. The gist of his response: No, The Times didn't cover the rally. But yes, The Times has covered the issues that led to anger behind the rally.

Here are notes on February numbers at latimes.com from Interactive Executive Editor Meredith Artley:

Colleagues:

February was a good month. Our Oscars coverage was a major highlight, with live blogging and fast filings, a stream of outstanding staff photography, and an Oscars quiz for Facebook users. The day after, more great photo galleries, video and analysis clearly resonated with readers when we set a daily traffic record for the year so far of 8.7 million page views. 

It was also a strong month for local coverage, with the relaunch of L.A. Now (which broke a new readership record) and the well-received Mapping L.A. project where users continue to discuss the boundaries and characteristics of their neighborhoods.

We had 128 million page views in February, up 25% from this time last year. About 23 million unique users visited us last month, an increase of 54% over last year. And our local audience has grown nearly 30% in the past year.

Work on the homicide and crime databases continues. Improvements to Mexico Under Siege are coming. We kicked off a neighborhoods project to bring together geographic information (think schools, real estate, crime, upcoming events, recent articles/photos/videos from us and elsewhere on the Web) and provide a place for discussion and debate within communities tbd. The idea is to package all the great stuff we have through a very local lens, and to create places on the site for readers to talk about the places they care about. And work continues on the Big Site Redesign.

Most-viewed articles, most-viewed photo galleries, top RSS feeds and more are in the jump.

As a full-page ad in today's main section tells readers, The Times on Tuesday will move its California section, long the B section of the newspaper, into an expanded A section that also will continue to include national and international news reports. The opinion and editorial pages, too, will stay in the main section.

The changes are to save money, as a January Business story explained, by requiring fewer press runs.

The streamlining means that on most weekdays, Los Angeles Times readers will receive four main sections, as well as Health on Mondays, Food on Wednesdays and Home on Saturdays. Sunday's sections will be unaffected.

More answers and explanations are below.

"According to Wednesday's paper this site is suppose to give the reason why you canceled Sally Forth. I find no reason given other than 'we wanted  to'.  ... It takes a lot of nerve not to listen to the people who keep you in your job , even if you think they give 'skewed responses.' "

That's an excerpt from Rachel Engler's comment, one of hundreds that have come in since readers learned of the change-up on The Times' comics pages (see post from Sunday).

Since then, two posts on this journal have tried to provide some of the thinking behind the changes, but readers have been left with some reasonable questions.

Readers were asked for several months about whether one strip should stay or go -- "For Better or for Worse." Yet Monday they were told both that "FBOFW" wasn't coming back and that a second strip that they didn't know was being considered for expulsion was also dropped ("Sally Forth").

Why were readers even polled, readers asked, especially if they found out later that editors don't rely entirely on reader input?

And what are the reasons behind what was called a "subjective" decision in dropping "Sally Forth"?

Alice Short, the assistant managing editor who oversees features, goes into detail that many say should have been given to them in the first place.