Garcia-Ruiz named WaPo managing editor Emilio Garcia-Ruiz was named The Washington Post's managing editor for digital, video and presentation departments on Friday and said he would try to "help find a way out of the industry's predicament." A native of the Washington area, Garcia-Ruiz attended Gonzaga High School in the District and the University of Maryland before being hired in 1987 as a night copy editor in The Post's sports section. He left in 1990 and became sports editor of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, where he directed Pulitzer Prize-winning pieces about academic fraud in the University of Minnesota men's basketball program. Later he worked at the Orange County Register and the Los Angeles Times. He returned to The Post in 2001 and two years later became assistant managing editor for sports news. He later served a stint as assistant managing editor for local news and most recently as editor for strategic projects. Garcia-Ruiz said that he hoped to emphasize "story telling" and work closely with the newsroom's other managing editor, Kevin Merida, who overseas reporters in news and features departments. "At the end of the day we're in the story telling business . . . and you can tell stories in more ways than ever before," he said. Garcia-Ruiz is the third person to serve as The Post's managing editor for digital operations in just over four years, since the online staff moved from its former offices in Virginia to The Post's headquarters in the District. The paper has battled to boost online readership in a highly competitive environment while stanching the decline in the print edition's circulation. "It's hard not to imagine a day - and it could be 30 years from now - when the print model no longer works because the costs are so high," Garcia-Ruiz said. He said The Post had to "bulk up digital in anticipation of that." "In this position, Emilio will be responsible for driving innovation in the newsroom across all digital platforms and for assuring that we have the skills, sensibilities, and practices necessary for success in a digital era," Post executive editor Martin Baron said in an e-mail to the staff. He also will be the newsroom's primary liaison with the business side on all digital efforts.