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09/23/2003
AP names new state news director, three regional directors
NEW YORK -- The Associated Press has appointed a new state
news director and three new regional news directors who will
work with AP's state bureaus in the East, Midwest, West and
South.
Tom Berman has been named director of state news/East. Michael
Giarrusso becomes director of state news/South, and David
Wilkison is the new director of state news/West. They will
report to Sarah Nordgren, newly named director of state news.
Nordgren also will work with state bureaus in the Midwest.
The appointments were announced Sept. 23 by Kathleen Carroll,
AP's executive editor and a senior vice president.
The four will work with the chiefs of bureau and news editors
in their regions, focused on helping those bureaus produce
outstanding state news reports of high value to all media
members and clients — print, online and broadcast. They
also will work closely with four regional vice presidents
on news and news-related bureau issues in their regions.
Berman will be based in Philadelphia, where he has been news
editor, overseeing coverage of such stories as the crash of
Flight 93 in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the rescue
of nine miners trapped in a western Pennsylvania mine. He
joined AP in Boston in 1997 and was a supervisor there before
moving to Philadelphia in 2000.
Berman grew up in South Orange, N.J., and is a graduate of
New York University. Before joining AP, he was a newspaper
reporter in Staten Island, N.Y., and Waltham, Mass.
Giarrusso, news editor in Atlanta since 1998, will remain
in that city in his new job. He grew up in Augusta, Ga., and
began his AP career in Atlanta as an intern in 1992 after
graduating from the University of Georgia's Grady College.
He also worked as correspondent in State College, Pa., and
as an editor on the national desk in New York.
Giarrusso has assisted on the editing of the aftermath of
the 2000 presidential election in Florida and was a part of
AP's coverage of the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
In 2000, he won his college's John E. Drewry award for outstanding
achievement within 10 years of graduation.
Wilkison has been chief of bureau in Kentucky since April
2002. He and his family will relocate to a city in the western
United States as he takes up his new responsibilities. Before
he was named COB, Wilkison was the assistant chief of bureau
and news editor in Philadelphia, news editor in Des Moines,
Iowa, and correspondent in Morgantown, W.Va., and Newark,
N.J.
Wilkison is a native of Dayton, Ohio, and a graduate of West
Virginia University.
Nordgren, who has been deputy director of state news since
2000, will continue to be based in Chicago. She has been assistant
bureau chief for AP in Chicago, worked as a reporter specializing
in children and family issues, and was Page One editor of
the Daily Herald in Arlington Heights, Ill. She won three
Lisagor Awards from the Chicago Headline Club, one each for
writing, reporting and magazine writing.
Nordgren is a native of Omaha, Neb., and a graduate of William
Smith College and Boston University. She previously worked
for Chicago's City News Bureau and for United Press International.
She succeeds Marty Thompson, who is retiring as director
of state news.
contact: Jack Stokes
212-621-1720
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