After 11 months on the job, Lucinda Ryan is being replaced as executive editor of the 55,000-circulation Palo Alto Daily News group by Mario Dianda (pictured), former editor of the Oakland Tribune. In January, Dianda was stripped of his job at the Oakland Trib and transferred by MediaNews to run the Pacifica Tribune, a weekly in San Mateo County.

This is the first high-profile move by Carole Leigh Hutton, who replaced Shareef Dajaini as publisher at the MediaNews-owned Daily News Group in January. Hutton was previously publisher of the Detroit Free Press and later a Knight Ridder vice president.

Ryan was hired by Dajani 11 months ago. They worked together at the weekly Alameda Journal. In January, MediaNews transferred Dajani to a job overseeing Jobs & Careers and other speciality publications.

Below is Hutton’s email to the paper’s staff:

Subject: New Editor Named

Colleagues,

The newsroom is making news today. Lucinda Ryan is leaving us to return to her Feature roots, and we are very fortunate to be replacing her with veteran newspaper editor Mario Dianda. A hard news journalist with deep editing and leadership experience, Mario was previously editor of the Oakland Tribune. Recently, he’s been helping us out with a temporary stint as publisher and editor of the Pacifica Tribune. That foray into the business side has surely left him even more anxious
to get back to a daily newsroom.

That’s where his roots are. In fact, some of those roots are right around the corner at the old Peninsula Times-Tribune, where he spent a decade reporting and editing before joining ANG.

In addition to his six-plus years as Oakland editor, Mario’s ANG accomplishments include stints as deputy executive editor and regional editor, as well as Hayward Daily Review editor and city editor.

A native of Oakland, Mario is a long-time San Carlos resident who lives there with his wife, a Redwood City school teacher, and son, a student at Carlmont High School in Belmont.

Lucy is headed over to ANG Newspapers, where she gets to fulfill her long-time ambition of writing and editing features content as a Deputy Features Editor. She also gets to work a lot closer to home, skipping the daily commute across the bay.

Lucy joined the Daily News just a year ago and managed to oversee an entire newsroom reorganization in that time.

Under her direction, we have improved both the quality and quantity of our local news report. She also helped implement a new deadline page flow that significantly enhanced our ability to produce good newspapers.

Lucy was previously editor of the Alameda Journal for five years. She has also served as city editor of the Daily Review in Hayward, and as a city, schools and g.a. reporter for The Oakland Tribune, Alameda Journal, San Leandro Times and The Montclarion.

These moves become effective March 26th.

Please join me in thanking Lucy and welcoming Mario.

For now, he can be reached at mdianda@angnewspapers.com or in Pacifica at 650-738-4545.

Carole Leigh

(Photo from the University of Colorado’s J-school newsletter, which also carries a feature of Dianda, who graduated from CU in 1976.)