Montecito to Get Second Newspaper

Montecito will become a two newspaper town in two weeks with the arrival of the Montecito Messenger — courtesy of Daily Sound owner Jeremy Gordon, documentary filmmaker Sam Tyler, and former Montecito Journal writer Judy Forman.

Tyler — who directed Citizen McCaw which chronicled the melt down of the News-Press — explained the new paper would be more politically mainstream and less conservative than the Montecito Journal, that it would provide home delivery, and that Messenger editors would not comment critically, as the Journal sometimes does, about its own letters to the editor. Former Journal writer Forman — also an investor — will cover the society beat.

It remains to be seen whether Montecito, as well heeled as it is, can sustain two weekly papers. Tim Buckley, one time editor of the Journal, said he expects the new paper to help expand the market, but conceded, “It’s going to be difficult.”