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Barry Smith made his mark in Nevada journalism as both an editor and an advocate.
He began his journalism career in 1977 as a reporter for the State Journal-Register in Springfield, Ill. He also worked for more than 16 years in Colorado — ten years as a reporter and city editor for the Durango Herald, and six years as an assistant city editor for the Greeley Tribune — before making his way to Nevada.
Smith came to the Silver State in 1996 to become editor of the Nevada Appeal. The paper had been through two ownership changes in the two years before he arrived and the staff was unsettled. After Smith was hired and Jeff Ackerman took over as publisher, the paper began to thrive. It increased circulation and became a leader in statehouse coverage. Smith wrote a weekly column and daily editorials, and edited much of the daily copy.
He also led the newsroom through two of its biggest news stories of the early aughts – the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, when the Appeal produced an extra edition, and a massive wildfire in 2004 that threatened to consume Carson City. The Appeal won numerous awards during this stretch, including Smith, who was honored as the state’s best columnist in 2002.
He was a member of the Nevada Press Association Board of Directors when the executive director position opened in 2006. “I used to have to worry about one newspaper,” he often said after he was hired as the organization’s director. “Now my job is to worry about all of them.”
Smith quickly became the voice of Nevada journalists, arguing in dozens of hearings in the Nevada legislature for improving the state’s open meeting and public records laws. In 2007, during his first session as a lobbyist, he worked closely with Sen. Terry Care to help enact sweeping reforms in the public records law. Other significant policy accomplishments included the first police body-cam statute, which ensures that body-cam recordings are a matter of public record, and the first Nevada Supreme Court rules on electronic access to courtrooms by journalists, as well as a statewide policy on public access to court records and evidence. In the 2017 session, he helped ensure that public notice remains in newspapers.
He retired as the press association director in 2018.
More on Barry Smith from The Las Vegas Review-Journal
