US and Canadian publisher Black Press has a new owner in a resolution of efforts to restructure the business.

Key management will join US-based Carpenter Media Group with the transfer of Black’s more than 150 newspapers and media operations in western Canada, Washington state and Hawaii, including the Honolulu Star-Advertiser.The country’s sixth-largest daily newspaper by print circulation, it has ‘the pulse of paradise’ as its slogan.

Carpenter Media Group said the acquisition had been completed through a stock purchase with Canadian financial partner Canso Investment Counsel, with new corporate entities formed in the US and Canada to hold the stock and assets. CMG will manage the companies, sharing total ownership equally with Canso. Dirks, Van Essen & April represented Black Press in the transaction.

Black Press had been restructuring under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act since January, with Canso a longtime creditor.

Community media company Carpenter has mastheads in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia and Kentucky, with Todd Carpenter, of Natchez, Mississippi its principal and chairman.

The company – of which Tim Prince of Mountain Brook, Alabama is chief executive – has offices in Natchez and Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Apart from the newspapers and media operations, Black Press assets include websites, lifestyle and tourism magazines, Amazon last-mile delivery franchises and national tourism website Hawaii.com. It serves about 4.5 million print readers and 13 million digital readers daily.

Among members of the Black Press management team taking on key roles at CMG are longtime regional COOs Randy Blair, Josh O’Connor and Dennis Francis, who have been named senior vice presidents. Senior vice presidents Chris Hargreaves and Andrew Franklin also add chief financial officer and chief digital roles, respectively, and others in both companies are accepting new roles and responsibilities.

Based in Richmond Hill, Ontario, Canso has total assets under management of more than CA$$40 billion (A$45.14 billion) and provides portfolio management services to Canadian institutional and private investors. Founded in 1997, the group is described as “enthusiastic about community media and its importance to the communities it serves”.

Carpenter said CMG had much in common with the Black organisation “in values and heritage, and will work hard to make our being chosen to lead in this next chapter of the company’s development a good decision for all.”

Prior to chairing CMG, Carpenter was a longtime chief executive and director of Boone Newsmedia which, including CMG’s holdings along with its own, managed 85 newspaper titles, various magazines, websites and other businesses in 12 states.