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You may have heard about the bad news for the news industry. All across the country newspapers and TV stations are cutting back, especially when it comes to serious public policy reporting and investigative journalism.

Lucky we live Hawaii.

In just two years, Civil Beat has already established itself as one of the leading news providers in the state. We have been named Hawaii’s best news site two years in a row by the Society of Professional Journalists and have won a number of state and as well. Our vision of providing in-depth public affairs reporting that fosters community debate on important issues has been solidly embraced by readers and community leaders.

Now we want to do much more. And unlike other news operations both locally and nationally we are not shrinking our news coverage through mergers or reductions in staff. Instead we are adding people who have the expertise and the energy to carry Civil Beat to a new level.

An important new addition to our staff is Jayson Harper, who joins Civil Beat as general manager. Jayson most recently was the publisher of PacificBasin Communications’ Travel Group, overseeing three titles. He has deep roots in Hawaii, especially in local media companies, and he spent a number of years at the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Jayson also is a familiar face around town; he’s a member of the Rotary Club of Honolulu and serves on the board of directors for the Institute for Human Services.

While Jayson, along with operations director Heidi Pliszka, is working to expand our reach in the local business community, we’re also ramping up our Washington, D.C. bureau. Civil Beat is the only Hawaii news outlet with a full-time presence in the nation’s capital, and Michael Levine is taking over the bureau from Adrienne LaFrance, who established it more than a year ago. Mike has broad experience in Hawaii issues, and is particularly well-suited to report on the impacts of federal decision-making on life here in the islands. He has been a reporter and editor on Kauai and Oahu, most recently covering Honolulu city and county governments for Civil Beat. Adrienne is not giving up her reporting efforts for us either, and will continue helping provide in-depth coverage of Congress and issues facing Hawaii as well as contributing to our popular .

You’ve already been reading reports and Inside Honolulu blog posts from Nick Grube, who is taking over Honolulu coverage from Mike. And Nathan Eagle, the former managing editor of The Garden Island on Kauai, came on staff a few months ago as our education and state government reporter.

They join Chad Blair, our chief political and legislative reporter, and Sophie Cocke, our land, energy and environment reporter. We have several interns helping us these days. And of course Sara Lin rounds out our editorial team as our veteran assistant editor.

That’s a lot of journalistic firepower for our still-startup staff. But we are all lucky to be part of a news organization that is growing and maturing, instead of cutting back and stagnating.

I often tell people I have one of the best news jobs in the country. And you can’t beat the weather.