www.roanoke.com

Megan Schnabel, editor

Michele Crim, designer

Annie Johnson, reporter

Michelle Skeen, editorial assistant

We have more changes to announce at The Blue Ridge Business Journal, our bi-weekly business publication.
In the recent past, we’ve relied on freelance writers, and an editor who doubles as a reporter.
Now, all that’s changing.
A few weeks ago, we announced a new editor: Megan Schnabel, a veteran metro editor for The Roanoke Times and a former business reporter here, has taken over as the journal’s full-time editor.
She joined our long-time designer, Michele Crim, as we moved the journal’s operations into The Roanoke Times newsroom to work alongside the staff of the daily newspaper.
Now, we have more staff additions to announce:
* Annie Johnson is the journal’s reporter. She most recently has been a reporter for Congressional Quarterly in Washington, covering Capitol Hill. She knows her business stuff, too. Annie has a degree in economics from the former Randolph-Macon Woman’s College in Lynchburg (now just Randolph College.). She also previously worked as an intern on our business team for The Roanoke Times, and later worked here as an editorial assistant before going off to D.C. We’re thrilled to have her back.
* Michelle Skeen is the journal’s editorial assistant. She’s a graduate of Virginia Tech, and has interned for the daily newspaper in Waynesboro, the News-Virginian. Michelle will be spending a lot of her time working on the Business Journal’s website, which is presently undergoing a major renovation.
We’ll have more details on that coming soon. But if you’d like to follow business developments on Twitter, you can do that now. The Business Journal has its own Twitter following at “BRBusinessJ” and on Facebook, where can you find us simply as “Blue Ridge Business Journal.”

-- Dwayne Yancey, senior editor

Did you see the Patrick Henry/Hidden Valley high school football opener Friday night? If you missed PH's 44-14 win, check out the video highlights on our new VarsityCast page. Look for it to be updated Friday nights with live new content.

In addition to the weekly game highlights (shot by by multimedia producer Chris Zaluski), you'll find a real-time Twitter feed with Timesland scores and a chance to predict which teams will come out on top in the 2009 season. Look for the "Varsity Forecasters" box on the lower right of the page and see how your picks compare with those of Robert

Robert Anderson, Roanoke Times preps editor

Anderson, our prep sports editor. You have until 4 p.m. Friday to enter your picks.

Have any suggestions for how we cover high school football, in print or online? Leave them here or contact Robert at robert.anderson@roanoke.com

While you're browsing that VarsityCast page, also look for video of Robert's season preview and profiles of new coaches and top players to follow.

Rep. Tom Periello

Reporter Janelle Rucker and photographer Sam Dean spent several days last week in Washington with Rep. Tom Perriello. With the country in economic crisis, the region's freshman congressman has been busy. Read the full story -- and watch the video -- on Sunday.

Roanoke Times editor Carole Tarrant's From the Newsroom column today:

Beginning with tomorrow's paper, you will see some changes in the makeup of your Monday-to-Saturday Roanoke Times.

As you might expect, these changes come about as our business joins many others in adjusting to the country's weakening economy.

In an effort to conserve newsprint - the wood pulp most of you are reading this on - we are combining some sections of the newspaper into the front news section. Most notably, the Virginia and Business sections will fold into the front news section.

I'll take a few minutes below to explain more of the changes in detail. But before I do, I want to emphasize a few things.

The first is we are a strong and profitable company whose dedication to serving the community remains unmoved. While our business, like many others these days, is challenged, our audience, is, in fact, strong. That's because while wood pulp carries our words to some people, we are reaching an expanding audience of readers every day who get our content on their computer or mobile device from our Web site, roanoke.com.

The second is we don't expect this reformatting of the paper to result in a considerable reduction in the news we deliver, particularly local news. We realize that many of you look to us, foremost, for our daily community coverage. We appreciate that you value the work of our 100-plus journalists who report on and explain the significance of news happening in Southwest Virginia.

Yes, we realize the changes you'll see Monday will take some getting used to. But we're asking for your patience during a time when businesses need to take prudent, proactive measures to ensure their future health.

Again, these changes do not affect your Sunday paper. That remains our largest publication of the week, the one where we broaden our coverage and write stories you can settle in with at a leisurely weekend pace.

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