Roy Guided Weekly Scheduled for Wed. Debut
Charlotte Roy, who guided the development of the New York Times Co.’s first black-oriented newspaper, is out as editor, the company confirmed today, a day before the first issue was due in the Florida community of Gainesville.
“Charlotte Roy is no longer the editor. A new editor has not been named at this time,” corporate spokeswoman Catherine Mathis confirmed for Journal-isms this morning.
No reason was given. Publisher James E. Doughton of the parent Gainesville Sun said later that until a permanent replacement for Roy is found, longtime employee Doris Chandler, the Sun’s business editor who is African American, would be co-editor along with former managing editor Rob Oglesby, who is not African American and who retired from the paper in 2001 after 31 years. Chandler was on the committee planning the paper, Doughton said.
“We certainly appreciate everything that Charlotte has done,” Doughton said. He said she left Monday.
Midday, “I just was called down and told that it wasn’t a good fit,” Roy told Journal-isms late today. “I’m job hunting. I want to find a good job. This was my dream job. I produced a wonderful product. The paper is excellent. Everybody I’ve been working with has said it is a remarkable job. I’m very proud.”
She said the Times Co. was “smart and far-sighted to do this.” She said she couldn’t speculate on why she was let go.
Doughton said the paper would still come out as scheduled on Wednesday, with 24 pages, a circulation of 10,000, an editorial staff of 1 1/2 plus the editors and eight or nine regular community contributors.
A reception to celebrate is planned for a “couple hundred” people tomorrow at the Harn Museum of Art, he said. He urged anyone reading the online edition to provide feedback to jim.osteen@gvillesun.com. Jim Osteen is the Sun’s editor.
The concept of the paper has been criticized as an affront to the black press since plans for it were disclosed in this column in June.
Then, Roy announced that “The Gainesville Guardian, the first New York Times-owned black newspaper, is hiring a general assignment reporter,” and sought job candidates.
However, as criticism mounted, the Times Co. denied the paper was “black.”
On July 1, Zachary M. Seward wrote on Forbes.com:
“Perhaps sensing the potential controversy, a spokesman for The Times pointed to East Gainesville’s equally large white population and insisted the Guardian would not be a black newspaper.
“‘We’re not characterizing it as that,’ said the spokesman, Toby Usnik. ‘It’s a weekly community paper that will service primarily the eastern Gainesville area.’
“But Roy, the paper’s editor who came from the Atlanta Daily World, one of the South’s largest black newspapers, said otherwise.
“‘There was a void in the Gainesville community,’ she said. ‘There was not a paper that was focusing on the African-American population. This paper is filling that void.'”
Roy is a former managing editor of the Daily World who has worked as a news or feature writer for the Detroit Free Press, the Capital Times in Madison, Wis., the old Wilmington Morning News in Delaware and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She also owned Roy Communications, an Atlanta-based marketing communications agency, and is a founding member of the National Association of Black Journalists.
“I’m the luckiest person in the world,” Roy told Journal-isms in June. “How often do you get a chance to start a new publication with the support of a major organization like the New York Times?”
- Karen Grigby Bates, National Public Radio: N.Y. Times Corp. Launches Paper for Black Readers
- Mark Fitzgerald, Editor and Publisher: Editor Out Just Before Debut Of N.Y. Times Co.’s ‘Black’ Paper
- Mark Jurkowitz, Boston Phoenix: Black and White: The New York Times Company’s plan for a free African-American weekly in Florida makes many see red
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