Who's behind the ownership curtain?

Here in the patch, we've seen a thousand Herald-Standard.com business stories over the years, promoting the opening or expansion of everything from grocery stores to flower shops to manufacturing faciliites to auto dealers.

Each and every one of them included one key fact: The actual owner(s) of the business, whose smiling face could usually be found in a prominent photograph accompanying the feel-good story.

Thus we were perplexed -- and somewhat curious -- that the Sunday, March 17 story, "SWC Properties opens real estate office in Uniontown" made no mention of who actually owns this fledgling new real estate company.

http://www.heraldstandard.com/news/business/swc-properties-opens-real-estate-office-in-uniontown/article_60ef47f4-7ed5-5460-a81e-3f25dbe5061f.html

Our curiosity was further piqued when a photo of a "broker" with the company showed him standing in front of the newspaper-owned building that formerly housed the now-failed HSTV operation. Before that, the site was home to Eddie's Fruit Basket.

Something about this presentation just wasn't adding up. So we visited the Pennsylvania Department of State website, where you can research such things, typed in SWC Properties, and easily found this listing:

SWC Properties LLC Current Name
Limited Liability Company - Domestic - Information
Entity Number: 4157830 Status: Active Entity Creation Date: 1/10/2013 State of Business.: PA Registered Office Address: 8 East Church Street
Uniontown PA 15401
Fayette Mailing Address: No Address

Then we used the same search engine and typed in Uniontown Newspapers Inc., and found this listing:
UNIONTOWN NEWSPAPERS INC Current NameBusiness Corporation - Domestic - Information
Entity Number: 368249 Status: Active Entity Creation Date: Registered Office Address: [Address Not Available]
PA 0 -0
Mailing Address: No Address

Officers
Name: VALERIE J LAUB Title: President Address: 8 E CHURCH ST
UNIONTOWN PA 15401-3563
Name: SANDRA C HARDY Title: Secretary Address: 8 E CHURCH ST
UNIONTOWN PA 15401-3563
Name: MICHAEL WHITE Title: Treasurer Address: 8 E CHURCH ST
UNIONTOWN PA 15401-3563
Name: STANLEY ELLIS Title: Vice President Address: 8 E CHURCH ST
UNIONTOWN PA 15401-3563

So, according to the Pennsylvania Department of State, the registered office address of SWC Properties turns out to be same address -- 8 E. Church St., Uniontown -- used by the owners/corporate officers of the company that runs Herald-Standard.com.

If you don't believe us, visit the website and look it up yourself. https://www.corporations.state.pa.us/corp/soskb/csearch.asp

Call us crazy, but this common address seems to be a pretty strong indication that the newspaper has branched out into the real estate business. We have no problem with that -- but, ethically and for the sake of journalistic accuracy and credibility, shouldn't that have been mentioned as part of the story?

Surely, Herald-Standard.com knows who the owner(s) of SWC Properties is/are, or there wouldn't have been a confirmable basis for a grand-opening story in the first place.

Was a conscious decision made somewhere along the line -- perhaps from the top-down -- to leave that information out of the story? If so, why? What's the big secret?