Debbie Van Tassel named Assistant ME

Debbie Van Tassel has been appointed assistant managing editor/administration for The Plain Dealer in Cleveland. She has been business editor since 1999.

Before going to the The Plain Dealer, Van Tassel was business editor, special-projects editor and Sunday magazine editor at the Akron Beacon Journal. She also was business editor at the Seattle Times. Three projects she worked on won Pulitzer prizes.

A New Jersey native, she graduated from Seton Hall University and began her journalism career at the now-defunct Woodbridge, N.J., News Tribune. She and her husband, Stuart Warner, a Plain Dealer editor, live in Hudson.

Paul O'Donnell has been named the new business editor, Managing Editor Tom O'Hara announced..

O'Donnell previously was deputy metro editor. He is a 24-year veteran of the news business and has worked at The Plain Dealer since 1990. He begins his new job Monday.

"Debbie and Paul did great work in their previous jobs, and they'll continue to excel in their new assignments," O'Hara said. "Both of them are pros."

O'Donnell takes over a talented staff who thrived under Van Tassel and her assistant editors, O'Hara said.

Debbie replaces Ted Diadiun, the paper's new reader representative.