Wisconsin Rapids City Times welcomes new editor

MARSHFIELD – The Wisconsin Rapids City Times has named veteran journalist Sirena Mankins as its new editor.

The Wisconsin native grew up in rural Manitowoc County, in the small town of Newton (she likes to describe it as 50 people and 5,000 cows). From a young age, she has been fascinated by the news.

“My parents would wake up on Sunday mornings and find me watching ‘Face the Nation’ and ‘Meet the Press,’” she said.

“They thought I was really weird,” she added with a laugh.

It was a constant battle between Mankins and her parents over who would get the newspaper first. What started as reading the comics quickly evolved into consuming the entire paper – especially the editorial page. She has always found uncovering what motivates people fascinating.

Mankins began her journalism career as a copy editor at the Oshkosh Northwestern in 1999, after attending the University of Wisconsin-Parkside in Kenosha. Since then, she’s worked at several other publications – even getting to make the call to, “Stop the presses!” during the 2000 presidential election. She spent almost a decade in Central Wisconsin at the Wausau Daily Herald, before the economic downturn forced a contraction in the newspaper industry.

But what could have been devastating turned into opportunity. Mankins was able to live in several other states – Indiana, followed by Texas and finally Florida – before moving back to Wisconsin to be closer to family.

“Those experiences in other states taught me that people everywhere basically want the same things: a safe community, quality schools and government accountability,” she said.

A mother of two daughters, Mankins also has 12 grandchildren, all of whom live in the area.

“Those ties to the community really drive home the importance of local news coverage,” she said. “The only place people are going to find out what their city council and school board are doing is if local journalists cover it. It’s not going to be done by Fox or CNN.”

Mankins welcomes your questions, comments and stories ideas. She can be reached at smankins@mmclocal.com.