announcement

Local News Now LLC, the publisher of ARLnow.com, announced today that it has acquired beloved D.C. neighborhood news site Borderstan.com and has agreed to sell BethesdaNow.com.

LNN acquired Borderstan in March from Matt Rhoades and Luis Gomez, who co-founded the site in 2008. The company plans to relaunch Borderstan early this summer, carrying on the site’s community-based reporting in the Dupont Circle, Logan Circle and U Street neighborhoods. As part of its relaunch Borderstan will add Columbia Heights to its coverage area.

LNN has hired Andrea Swalec, previously a reporter and editor at the local news website DNAinfo New York, to be the company’s new editorial director. Andrea will help support and oversee LNN’s three current sites — ARLnow.com, BethesdaNow.com and RestonNow.com — and will take the lead in launching the company’s new Capitol Hill site, HillNow.com. A tentative launch date of Oct. 20 has been set for Hill Now.

Andrea previously worked at NBC Local Integrated Media and contributed to The Current Newspapers — including Voice of the Hill, formerly a weekly newspaper covering Capitol Hill — and the New York Times blog The Local.

Serving the Reston (Va.) community, Reston Now is helmed by Karen Goff, a long-time Reston resident who most recently worked as a local editor for Patch.com. Before transitioning to digital journalism, Goff was a feature writer and sports reporter for the Washington Times, and a metro reporter for the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel.

“I am so excited to work with Local News Now,” Goff said. “In my more than three years with Patch I learned how valuable hyperlocal news is to communities. Reston has really embraced online, up-to-the-minute news, and working with a locally-owned company will give residents the voice and outlet they need.”