Little Rock daily hires two new biz reporters

The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in Little Rock has hired two new business reporters.

Nathan Owens has been hired to cover Tyson Foods. He previously was a general assignment reporter at the El Dorado News-Times in Arkansas.

Owens is a University of Arkansas graduate who also interned at the Oxford American in Little Rock.

Dalton LaFerney has been hired to cover transportation from the paper’s Springdale bureau. He starts on July 5.

LaFerney recently graduated from the University of North Texas. He interned on the business desk of the Dallas Morning News, and Rachel O’Neal, the business editor at the Democrat-Gazette, said he came highly recommended by Morning News business editor Paul O’Donnell.

Chris Roush

Chris Roush was the dean of the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. He was previously Walter E. Hussman Sr. Distinguished Professor in business journalism at UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a former business journalist for Bloomberg News, Businessweek, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Tampa Tribune and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. He is the author of the leading business reporting textbook "Show me the Money: Writing Business and Economics Stories for Mass Communication" and "Thinking Things Over," a biography of former Wall Street Journal editor Vermont Royster.