• by Sara Guaglione , January 15, 2020

The Philadelphia Inquirer’s CEO-publisher Terrance C.Z. Egger will retire and be replaced next month by Lisa Hughes, a member of the company’s board of directors.

Hughes will be the first female publisher of The Inquirer in its 190-year history.

Egger has led The Inquirer since 2015, when he became head of the former Philadelphia Media Network, which included The Inquirer, the Daily News and Philly.com.

A year later, The Inquirer was donated to nonprofit Lenfest Institute for Journalism. 

Hughes, who served as vice president-publisher of TheNew Yorker until 2017, will take over February 3. 

According to a story published by The Inquirer, Hughes wants to “build on Egger’s strategies to diversify revenue sources, through both commercial means and philanthropy, to preserve local journalism in a time of economic turmoil.”

“Nothing matters more in our democracy than local journalism — to speak truth to power, to hold elected officials accountable, to celebrate our sports teams’ wins and losses, and to report on justice reform, the education system and gun violence. All of which has been part of The Inquirer’s beat for 190 years,” she stated.

Hughes was reportedly chosen for the job due to her experience bringing the New Yorker, a legacy print publication, into the digital age, and focusing on reader revenue as print advertising declined.

The Inquirer now has 26% journalists of color, compared with 14% in 2016, according to Inquirer executive editor-senior vice president Stan Wischnowski  The daily newspaper's newsroom is roughly 55% male, down from 65% in 2016, he added.