Schaefer to oversee auto and biz coverage at Free Press

Jim Schaefer

Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Jim Schaefer has been named senior news director for autos, business and education coverage at the Detroit Free Press.

A Free Press story states, “Schaefer, 55, has worked for the Free Press in two stints since 1988. He’s been a reporter, columnist, video game critic and, for the last three years, editor of the newspaper’s investigative team.

“In 2009, the newspaper won the Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting for coverage of then-Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s text message scandal, an investigative project led by Schaefer and his reporting partner, M.L. Elrick. As a result of the newspaper’s work, Kilpatrick and Chief of Staff Christine Beatty both resigned and went to jail. Kilpatrick eventually was indicted federally and is serving a 28-year prison sentence for corruption.

“‘The Free Press has been home to me for a long time, and I’ve been able to try lots of different things. But this opportunity is fresh and new,’ Schaefer said. ‘The chance to manage a great team of reporters covering some of the most important topics in Detroit was too much to pass up. I’m really looking forward to it.'”

Read more here.

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.