Jennifer Goodstein, Publisher
BY DUNCAN OSBORNE AND LINCOLN ANDERSON | The parent company of Gay City News has been sold to a business executive with experience in information technology and e-commerce.
“I was looking for something in New York that had quality and integrity behind it,” Jennifer Goodstein said of purchasing Community Media, LLC, effective July 31.
The award-winning newspaper chain also includes the Villager, the East Villager/ Lower East Sider, Downtown Express, and Chelsea Now and was operated for the past 12 years by John W. Sutter.
“John has maintained, over the years, a very strong reputation of having a place where people can find a trusted source of what’s happening,” Goodstein said. “I do feel that, looking at the condition of the papers — I think the hard work is done.”
Goodstein was a key e-business executive at MetLife for ten years. Prior to that, she was director of information technology for instruction and curriculum at a Maryland school district.
Commenting that New York City is “anything but vanilla,” Goodstein said that “the diversity” of the neighborhoods and the issues the chain’s newspapers cover is a compelling factor in her interest in assuming control of the properties.
Asked what he was most proud of during his tenure, Sutter, who is 62, said, “Working with a group of committed professionals who believe in community journalism. Covering the best neighborhoods in the entire world. Trying to write fairly, forcefully, and independently about events that have meaning in the lives of our readers, week in and week out.”
Goodstein, 47, is married to Les Goodstein, who is a senior vice president at News America Inc. They live in Manhattan and have a college-age son, Steven.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Gay City News began publishing in March of 2002 when Troy Masters and Paul Schindler joined forces with Sutter to bring their newspaper, LGNY, into the Community Media fold during the difficult post-9/11 economy.
The social and political progress of New York's lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community has been breathtaking over the past ten years, and, backed by the resources and expertise of Community Media, Gay City News deployed a powerful team of veteran LGBT journalists to follow it.
“I couldn’t be more proud of the journalists who contribute news, commentary, and arts coverage to Gay City News,” Schindler said. “They have made Gay City News the award-winning newspaper that it is. Given Jennifer’s passion for newspapers, I look forward to working with her to continue the tradition.”
Masters, who has published LGBT newspapers and magazines since 1988, including OutWeek, QW, and LGNY, will continue as associate publisher. Schindler will remain editor-in-chief.
Gay City News and its sister publications garnered a significant share of awards, with Community Media regularly being acknowledged as among the top five newspaper groups in New York State. Over the past 12 years, the group has won more than 200 awards for excellence in the New York Press Association’s Better Newspaper Contest. The Villager is a three-time winner of the Stuart Dorman Award as the best community weekly in the state.
In March, Community Media was honored with 27 awards, ten of them for Gay City News, including recognition for excellence in local government reporting, editorial pages, arts coverage, graphic illustration, use of color, and advertising.
