Smith will be assistant editor, Eddy will join Sumter Item newsroom

Change is inevitable. The staff of any local newspaper knows that much.

As The Sumter Item continues to evolve, it will soon do so minus one familiar face but with the addition and promotion of two more.

Shelbie Goulding, news and newsletter editor for The Item, is set to take her next step in life as she moves to join her husband, Yuri Morin, who is serving in Europe for the U.S. Air Force. They met while he was stationed at Shaw Air Force Base.

During her nearly four years at The Item, Goulding oversaw the expansion of the paper's email newsletter content and strategy, giving thousands of people daily, easy access to the news, sports, video and multimedia storytelling they value, right at their fingertips. She leaves The Item as an award-winning journalist for those newsletters as well as reporting on local government, police and food.

In her place, The Item welcomes the promotion of Melanie Smith from copy editor and page designer to assistant editor and the addition of Bryn Eddy as reporter and newsletter editor.

In some way, The Item has always been a part of Smith's life. She was born on Shaw Air Force Base, and her parents are decades-long subscribers. She began working for The Item in high school as an intern editor and designer and continued while studying journalism at USC in Columbia and Sumter. She has been with the paper full time for 14 years.

Her design of The Item has won numerous S.C. Press Association awards, including being named best in the state in 2022.

She said she enjoys helping reporters polish their stories and designing pages that give readers information they need quickly. In this role, she will do just that.

Eddy returns to Sumter after working as a reporter in Myrtle Beach. Hailing from the Fort Mill area, she was introduced to The Item as the recipient of the SCPA's Hubert Osteen Memorial Scholarship in the summer of 2021, during which time she wrote feature and lifestyle stories on topics such as the Sumter County Museum, local teachers and the Carolina Shag Club.

During her time as editor-in-chief at The Johnsonian, the student newspaper at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, the paper was awarded general excellence by the SCPA in its collegiate news contest.

She worked at The Sun News in Myrtle Beach before joining the staff of My Horry News, where she has been reporting for and designing its monthly publication North Strand News. There, she has written on a range of topics, from how the state is looking to remove taxes on period products to Black churches seeking to preserve their history to the lingering impacts of Agent Orange on Myrtle Beach veterans.

Eddy will report on the city of Sumter, Sumter County, Shaw Air Force Base and general coverage within the newspaper's reach, and she will lead the continuation and growth of The Item's newsletters.

These changes take effect Aug. 1.