The Comeback Mossback   

Knute "Skip" Berger returns to his old job as editor in chief of Seattle Weekly following a two-year sabbatical.

After what turned out to be a two-year sabbatical, Knute "Skip" Berger, 48, resumes his old job as editor in chief of the Seattle Weekly. The self-described "mossback" (someone set in his ways) started writing a book about the Northwest and became a public radio commentator and federal disaster-assistance worker. But after 9/11, Berger says, he realized he wanted to be "engaged with these big things that are happening" as a writer and editor. He says David Schneiderman, CEO of owner Village Voice Media, suggested he return to the alternative paper, which competes with another free weekly, the Stranger, for readers and advertising. They both want the paper to break more news. In a memo to staffers, Schneiderman says he asked Audrey Van Buskirk, who had been in the editor's job less than two years, to step down and announced that Managing Editor Bethany Jean Clement would depart as well, because Berger was bringing in his own managing editor, Chuck Taylor. Taylor, a Seattle Times reporter for 16 years, edited the union's strike paper during the walkout by Times and Post-Intelligencer staffers nearly two years ago (see "Middle Man," March 2001).