SFGATE Local Editor
Your Impact:
Under the direction of SFGATE’s Deputy Managing Editor, the Local Editor will be a versatile journalist with a deep understanding of San Francisco and the Bay Area, plus enough intellectual curiosity to want to tell stories that matter to the people who live here. The Local Editor will be able to toggle between fast-paced daily news stories and the well-sourced, deep-dive features that cover the daily drama of living in the city, whether that’s writing about a neighborhood uproar over a new ghost kitchen hub flooding a quiet city street with delivery app drivers, or kayaking out to the only privately owned island in the San Francisco Bay to uncover the story behind it. We want someone who will dig deep to cover the Bay Area’s neighborhoods in incredibly unique ways and find stories that locals didn’t even know mattered to them.
Why SFGATE?
Launched in 1994, SFGATE.com was one of the first large-market media sites in the world and served as the exclusive digital home of the San Francisco Chronicle for 19 years. In 2019, the Chronicle (which can now be found online at the paywalled sfchronicle.com) and SFGATE officially became two separately run entities with their own editorial staffs and independent newsrooms.
Today, SFGATE is a digital-only publication that reaches more than 28 million readers every month and tells the stories of the people, places and ideas that make San Francisco, and the Bay Area at large, the weird and wonderful place that it is. We help readers navigate their day, whether it’s by keeping them updated on big breaking news, guiding them to interesting local experiences or sharing a part of the Bay they haven’t seen before.
The site is home to seven verticals: Culture, offering a unique mix of the entertainment news you actually need, and the underground stories from hidden corners of the Bay Area you want; Local, the premier destination for everything that life in San Francisco encompasses; Sports, covering the intersection of sports and culture; Travel, covering everything from flight deals and travel news to hotel hacks and under-the-radar day trips; Food + Drink, where we tell you the backstory of the people behind the bar and in the kitchen; and News; plus, SFGATE has satellite editors covering Lake Tahoe, California Parks, the Central Coast, Hawaii, Disneyland, Los Angeles and Cannabis.
What you’ll do:
- Consistently have ideas — you’ll be given a blank canvas to tell stories that matter. You need to have a constant stream of ideas to paint this, and a vision for covering life in San Francisco and the Bay Area. We are absolutely not looking for someone to just aggregate the internet into oblivion. What we are looking for is someone who can apply ambitious creativity to journalism about San Francisco and the Bay Area at large, going a layer deeper on where we live and why we love it — from deep dives on the mysterious door levers in San Francisco Victorians to a profile of the truck driver who helped move a Victorian from one neighborhood to another to an investigation into unsanctioned signs installed along San Francisco's Wiggle bike route.
- Be autonomous — this position comes with a lot of trust, to both keep an editorial calendar, meet deadlines, understand analytics and communicate with the copy desk, photo department and illustrators. You have to be able to do all of these things and do them well.
Have a fantastic network — a big part of this role is being someone who already has the network to be able to know which stories to tell. We want someone who is — and has been — part of the community they write about, that already knows who should be profiled, what places are beloved and what topics will hit a chord with locals and visitors. - Be consistent — not only is this an idea-heavy job, it’s a writing-heavy job, we want someone who can move the audience with their features, to give them smart, offbeat local items to keep them informed throughout the week, and have the planning foresight to make sure they have something really great lined up for weeks to come.
Be organized — you’ll partner with multiple different editors and reporters for projects both big and small, all intended to help us collaborate so we can tell larger, more important stories. We need someone who can keep it all straight, and be able to shift from one task to another without missing a beat.
Find emotional connections — we don’t want “best of” lists of the prettiest staircases in San Francisco or profiles of new realtors, we want to know how and why that cartoonish tower ever got built on Telegraph Hill, who’s renting San Francisco’s tiny ‘staircase to nowhere, we want to see inside the windmills at the end of Golden Gate Park for the first time, we want to meet the man who has painted hundreds of Victorians and changed the way our city looks and we want to know why ultra-wealthy banker blasted a huge hole in a Bay Area cliff. We want ambitious journalism that shines a new light on our crazy city.
Who You Are:
- You have 5+ years of relevant experience writing and editing at a publication or in a digital media environment
- You know the Bay Area inside and out, and live in or very near San Francisco
- You have a deep knowledge of the area that spans beyond a single discipline (Local is our broadest vertical — we already have a Culture Editor and a Food Editor and Politics and Tech Reporters, Local is everything in-between that matters to people living in San Francisco and the Bay Area)
- You have a vision for what a great Local section could look like, and a plan to make it a reality
- You have experience managing and mentoring other writers
- You have strong attention to detail, and a journalist’s sense of editorial integrity
- You have strong communication skills, a collaborative attitude and an eagerness to work in partnership with site leaders.
- You have a passion for journalism and telling stories.
- You’ve read SFGATE and have an understanding of the brand and voice.
In accordance with applicable law, Hearst is required to include a reasonable estimate of the compensation for this role if hired in California. The reasonable estimate is between $80,000 and $90,000. Please note this information is specific to those hired in San Francisco. If this role is open to candidates outside of San Francisco, the salary range would be aligned to that specific location. A final decision on the successful candidate’s starting salary will be based on a number of permissible, non-discriminatory factors, including but not limited to skills and experience, training, certifications, and education.
About the San Francisco Chronicle & SFGate:
The Chronicle is world-class journalism, San Francisco style. With name-brand voices and a keen editorial eye, The Chronicle is an authority that still surprises. It’s not afraid of being controversial or of doing things that haven’t been done. It’s bolder, brighter, and fearless. It’s news that is delivered to the discerning reader through multiple platforms.
SFGate provides a 360-degree view of San Francisco, wildly reflective of right now. Provocative, energetic and unapologetic, the Gate is in constant conversation with the world's most eclectic city.
Join our world-class team!
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