Outdoors Reporter

The News Tribune is looking for a collaborative, audience-focused reporter to help us expand our coverage of outdoors and recreation in the Pierce County area.

This reporter will take a unique service journalism approach that focuses on listening to and serving local readers with quick, need-to-know information in an accessible format. We’re looking for a reporter who lives and breathes outdoor coverage, from hunting and fishing to hiking, paddling, skiing, birdwatching and beyond, and wants to give our subscribers expert advice. You will be the face of our coverage, so front-facing video experience is a major plus.

You will write quick recommendation stories like, “Here are the best 5 hikes in December,” while producing a video showing us your favorite part of one hike. Our readers love updated information on their local trails, new opportunities on outdoor recreation, anything related to our beautiful Mount Rainier and much more. There’s a demand from our subscribers, and the successful candidate will create a new brand of community coverage for The News Tribune and themselves.

This beat is fertile ground for a resourceful, high-metabolism reporter eager to build a following by publishing often, typically daily. You are right for this role if you understand that frequent, consistent publishing builds habits in readers, who come to trust that they can depend on you to deliver each day, giving them a reason to come back and engage.

At The News Tribune, we put a premium on breaking stories first, investing in hard-nosed, accountability journalism and telling unique stories that our audience can’t get anywhere else.

We are headquartered in Tacoma, Washington, a lively region for news and an interesting place to live. Our community is growing, with up-and-coming restaurants, breweries, thriving museum and theater districts and myriad opportunities for outdoor recreation, from water sports to mountaineering. We’re uniquely located near three national parks — Mount Rainier being our favorite — and the Sound. The big-city lights of Seattle are only 30 miles away.

We are part of Mc Clatchy, a digitally driven company focused on innovation, with newsrooms in 30 communities in the United States.

The expected schedule is 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday with a one-hour lunch break.

In this role, you will need to:

• Focus on stories that build readerships 
• Master engaging multimedia storytelling
• Use social media platforms to help distribute and highlight work
• Demonstrate speed, competitiveness and SEO savvy through aggregating and storytelling tools
• Understand and use audience metrics to help increase readership
• Shoot photos and video when needed
• Skillfully use content-management systems
• Live in Pierce County

Mc Clatchy Media’s journalists are expected to take advantage of opportunities to ethically harness and leverage artificial intelligence and other automation to enhance and elevate their work and to find efficiencies that free them to focus on source-building and high-quality, deeply reported journalism.

The anticipated base pay range for this position is between $24.04 and $33.65 per hour. Individual base pay may vary within that range depending on job-related knowledge, skills, experience, department equity and relevant education.

What you'll bring:

The successful candidate should meet many, though not necessarily all, of the following requirements:

• College degree or similar experience
• 2-3 years of reporting experience
• Solid news judgment and excellent journalism ethics
• An intuitive sense of what’s important and interesting to audiences on all platforms
• A deep curiosity and high energy
• A commitment to diverse coverage through community engagement and source building
• A collaborative work ethic and the ability to communicate easily with people on our team and across the company
• Proficient knowledge of technology, including content management systems and storytelling tools
• Ability to quickly and accurately research and verify the authenticity of information, sources, photos and video. 
• Must have reliable transportation. 
• Must have valid driver’s license and vehicle insurance required (at least minimum insurance required for the state in which the employee works).

What we’ll bring:  

As a journalist at Mc Clatchy, you will join a supportive, flexible, collaborative team. Mc Clatchy strives to be an employer of choice, and our benefits package is made with this goal in mind. With a focus on health, well-being, wealth and daily life, our package options include healthcare coverage for employees and their families, financial protection from expected and unexpected expenses, multiple no-cost wellness resources and even coverage for four-legged friends.

Our overall benefits package also includes a 401(k) with employer match, competitive paid time off and corporate holidays, and a variety of mental health benefits. With an excellent support team and with focus on your well-being as a top corporate strategy, Mc Clatchy provides benefits to support you and your family in achieving your health and wellness goals. For more information on Mc Clatchy's benefit plan, please visit Mc Clatchy Livewell.com.

To apply, include a persuasive cover letter, your resume and four to six examples of your best work.

About Mc Clatchy Media

The Mc Clatchy Media Company features a portfolio of vibrant and trusted news, lifestyle, entertainment brands and a robust retail distribution network. Our iconic local news brands such as the Miami Herald, The Kansas City Star and The Sacramento Bee, have collectively earned a total of 57 Pulitzer prizes and are complemented by popular lifestyle and entertainment brands such as Us Weekly and Woman’s World. Together, our brands reach more than 100 million unique visitors a month. The Mc Clatchy Retail Network, our distribution and logistics arm, offers delivery to more than 56,000 retail locations weekly.

Salary/Compensation: $24.04 - $33.65 per hour

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