The nonprofit Cambridge Day names a veteran journalist as its new editor

The nonprofit Cambridge Day is beefing up, hiring veteran journalist Michael Fitzgerald as its editor. Founding editor Marc Levy will remain on board as well.

For many years the Day operated as pretty much a one-person shop, but now it’s got a board of directors and regular contributors. It also offers a weekly print edition and offers some coverage of Somerville as well as Cambridge.

This is yet another example of a community stepping up to fill the gap left by the newspaper chain Gannett’s abandonment of its weekly newspapers in Eastern Massachusetts. Gannett shut down the venerable Cambridge Chronicle in 2022, ending its print edition and replacing local news on its Wicked Local website with irrelevant filler from around the region.

The full announcement of Fitzgerald’s hiring follows.

Cambridge Day Names Award-Winning Journalist Michael F. Fitzgerald as New Editor-in-Chief

CAMBRIDGE, MA — In a move to strengthen the reach and depth of local news coverage in Cambridge and Somerville, the board of Cambridge Day, a nonprofit, donor-supported news service (cambridgeday.com) has named award-winning writer, reporter and editor Michael F. Fitzgerald as the publication’s new editor-in-chief. Founding editor Marc Levy will continue at the paper, writing and editing, bringing his deep knowledge of the community to the next chapter of Cambridge Day.

Fitzgerald brings more than three decades of experience in journalism, with senior editorial roles at major publications and a career spanning coverage of business, technology, education and public health. He was an articles editor at the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, founding news editor of ZDNet, and most recently editor-in-chief at Harvard Public Health, which he relaunched as an editorially independent digital platform focused on solutions journalism about public health. His work has appeared in the New York Times, The Economist, Fast Company, and MIT Technology Review, among others.

“I’m thrilled to be joining the team and working to expand Cambridge Day’s coverage of this vibrant, vital community,” Fitzgerald says. “Marc has done yeoman’s work in keeping local news alive. I’m eager to work with him in taking the publication to a new level.”

“There’s a lot of excitement here about this next phase of Cambridge Day,” Levy said. “I hope that turns very quickly into more of the local journalism our communities deserve and more ability to respond to the needs of our residents and businesses.”

Respected colleagues and leaders in journalism praised Fitzgerald’s appointment. Former Boston Globe editor Brian McGrory described him as an excellent, talented and very thoughtful editor. “He is a creative thinker who does great work with stories and with writers doing stories,” McGrory said. “He is good at cultivating people. He was very well regarded at the Globe.”

Richard Tofel, former president of ProPublica, assistant publisher of the Wall Street Journal and a consultant for nonprofit news organizations and funders, worked with Michael at Harvard Public Health as an advisory board member. “Michael Fitzgerald is a talented editor and a very solid news pro,” Tofel added. “Cambridge Day is lucky to get him.”

Ann Marie Lipinski, former curator of the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University and the former editor of the Chicago Tribune, added: “Michael is a thoughtful and committed journalist who thinks deeply about serving the needs of readers. He is excited about this role and will bring great experience to strengthening this important source of local news.”

Fitzgerald has deep ties to Cambridge. He was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard and lived for a decade in the city’s Agassiz-Baldwin neighborhood. His two sons attended the Amigos School and Cambridge Rindge and Latin School. Michael and his wife currently live in Framingham.

The board was impressed with Fitzgerald’s exceptional journalism credentials, his leadership experience and his passion for strong local journalism. “Michael is committed to creating a vital, informative, engaging news source that the city of Cambridge wants and deserves that reaches all its residents. We believe Michael will be a strong steward of the paper in its next phase, upholding standards of transparency, accountability and independence through trusted, reliable fact-based journalism.”

The board also expressed gratitude for Levy’s tireless work on the paper. “We are enormously grateful to Marc who started the paper in 2009 and has worked heroically for over a decade and a half to bring local journalism to Cambridge. We look forward to working with Michael, Marc and future staff to build upon Marc’s foundational work, as we relaunch the paper to expand the scope, breadth and reach of Cambridge Day in a sustainable way for years to come.”

Cambridge Day became a non-profit news operation in November of 2024 with the aid of a seed grant from the Cambridge Community Foundation.