Gilbert Bailón has been named executive editor of Chicago Public Media’s WBEZ.
He’ll oversee the organization’s growing broadcast news and online operations. He’ll also lead the station’s partnership with the Chicago Sun-Times, which Chicago Public Media acquired in 2022.
He starts the new position in October.
Bailón was most recently the executive editor at KERA, Dallas’s NPR affiliate. He departed that position in May after 14 months on the job.
Before KERA, the veteran journalist worked from 2007 to 2022 at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, including as editor-in-chief for a decade.
He previously spent 21 years in various roles at the Dallas Morning News, starting as a reporter and rising up the ranks to executive editor of the paper in 1998. Five years later, he launched Spanish-language sister publication Al Día, becoming its founding editor and publisher.
His earlier career included jobs as a reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, the San Diego Union-Tribune and the Los Angeles Daily News.