Phil Bronstein (born 1951) was the executive vice president and editor of the San Francisco Chronicle.
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Bronstein's career began as a reporter with KQED-TV in San Francisco. He would later move to the San Francisco Examiner. At the Examiner, Bronstein specialized in investigative projects and was a foreign correspondent for eight years. He has won awards for his coverage of the Philippines from the Overseas Press Club, Associated Press, the World Affairs Council and Media Alliance. Bronstein was a 1986 Pulitzer Prize finalist for his work in the Philippines and went on to cover conflicts in other parts of Southeast Asia, El Salvador, Peru and the Middle East. He was named executive editor of the Examiner in 1991, having previously served as managing editor for news. Under his service, the Examiner circulation declined rapidly, which Bronstein blamed on the afternoon delivery of the paper.
Bronstein was named executive vice president and editor of the San Francisco Chronicle in March 2003. He had been senior vice president and executive editor of the paper when Hearst Corp. bought The Chronicle. They then transferred ownership of the declining Examiner to the politically well-connected Fang family in March 2000.[1][2]
After years of circulation drops, in late March 2007, Bronstein called an emergency staff meeting and reportedly stated that the news business "is broken, and no one knows how to fix it." This meeting occurred after several weeks of articles focused on the influence of the Internet and the blogosphere made front page headlines in the Chronicle.[3]
On January 23, 2008, Bronstein announced that he was leaving his job as editor of the Chronicle to take an editor-at-large position with Hearst Newspapers. Ward Bushee, editor of the Arizona Republic, was announced as Bronstein's replacement effective February 1, 2008.
He was married to actress Sharon Stone from February 1998 until January 2004. Together they adopted a son Roan. Later he remarried. He lives in Mill Valley, CA with his wife and three kids.
In June 2001, he was seriously injured by a Komodo dragon. He entered its enclosure at the Los Angeles Zoo after being invited in by the dragon's keeper. Bronstein was bitten on his bare foot, as the keeper had told him to take off his white shoes, which could have potentially excited the dragon.[4][5][6]