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Digging through the email from my days away turns up a memo from Ethan Smith, the new chief of the Wall Street Bureau in Los Angeles. He's making a hire and a beat shift, and yielding his spot on the music beat after a decade or so. The memo from last week:
From: Smith, Ethan
Sent: Monday, April 01, 2013 11:27 AM
Subject: Ch-ch- changes...
Folks
I have two exciting pieces of L.A. bureau news.
After nearly a year with us on a “temporary” basis, Erica Phillips is officially joining the bureau as a staff reporter, teaming up with Tammy in covering general news, politics and all things Southern California. Since May, Erica has done tons of memorable work, including aheds on martian terraforming and high-heel aerobics, tracking down an octogenarian three-strikes convict named (what else?) Pops, and ferreting out eye-popping details about controversial NFL replacement ref Lance Easley (who unlike Erica, did not successfully pull off a temp-to-staff transition).
Hannah Karp, who has made an equally big mark here in even less time than Erica, will be moving from her current GA slot into the music beat. In less than six months, Hannah has delivered fantastic coverage of our local culture and commerce, from Venice Beach art cops, to curbside organic microfarmers in South Central, to errant sea lions in San Pedro. Having gone head-to-head with college football coaches in her previous role, Hannah is well prepared to tangle with the many tough characters she will encounter in her new role. (On a personal note, I can’t quite believe that I’m finally giving up the beat I’ve held since joining the Journal nearly 10 years ago, but it is clearly time to move on. My growing bureaucratic and editing obligations have made the beat an increasingly marginal part of my job, to no one’s benefit.)
Congratulations to both on these very well deserved advances!
Thanks
Ethan
Smith was promoted to bureau chief in Los Angeles in February after running the bureau on an interim basis since September. He was a deputy in the bureau from 2009 on. If you care to follow him, Smith tweets as ethanwsj.
