The Press Association has strengthened its news and entertainment coverage in America with two new appointments.
Victoria Ward is the new New York correspondent, while current news correspondent Mark Sage will remain in America to become PA Entertainment’s New York correspondent and oversee the expansion of PA’s celebrity and entertainment coverage. Victoria, (26), began her career at PA in 2002 as a reporter on the agency’s news training scheme. Mark, (25), joined PA in 2000 after working in regional newsrooms in the north and Midlands of England.

Street wardens in Wandsworth demanded an apology from the local council after finding out about job cuts through an article in the Wandsworth Borough News.
The council had failed to inform its employees before sending out the public agenda for a meeting of the council, which the paper reported on as a prelim to the decision being made.

The Wiltshire Times has opened its archive of pictures covering more than a century of life in the county.
The result is a new book, Wiltshire: Life and Times, part of the newspaper’s 150th anniversary celebrations.

Journalism students who have their stories published in the Lancashire Evening Post have the chance to scoop a £300 prize.
The money is being made available by the newspaper to journalism students at the University of Central Lancashire in memory of former Post writer Alan Burgess, who died at 44 after a battle against cancer.

Staff at the Weston and Somerset Mercury are polishing their halos after the success of a 32-page special full of school nativity photos.
The supplement was published last week, with photographers visiting a record 72 schools during the festive season.