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Capital New York Purchased by the Owner of Politico

Politico owner Robert Allbritton has purchased Capital New York and will expand the site significantly, according to an announcement on their website.

By Brian Feldman
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Politico owner Robert Allbritton has purchased Capital New York and will expand the site significantly, according to an announcement on their website. Late Sunday night, Capital founders and co-editors Josh Benson and Tom McGeveran announced the sale, with which they intend to grow Capital as a "free-standing sibling publication" to the DC-based Politico.

The acquisition does come with some cross-pollination however. In addition to his work as executive editor of Politico, Jim VandeHei will now also serve as Capital's president, and Katherine Lehr and Cally Stolbach will join the New York publication of the business side.

One of the key parts of the acquisition is that it will allow Capital to expand significantly, the co-editors wrote in a separate post outlining their plans for the next few months. According to Byers, that means at least two dozen more positions need to be filled, which would, in essence, triple the size of Capital's masthead.

In addition, the influx of funding from Allbritton will allow Capital to redesign their website and introduce new revenue streams: "We've always believed that journalism needs more than display advertising to support itself. With POLITICO, we'll have the strategic and organizational muscle to tap into other revenue streams," the announcement says. Exactly what those streams will be is not yet clear, although Politico is currently experimenting with a paywall section called Politico Pro.

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.