From a Washington Monthly story by Steven Waldman headlined “The Coming Era of ‘Civic News'”:
Francis Wick’s family has been running local newspapers since 1926, when his grandfather Milton and his grand-uncle James took over the Niles Daily Times in Niles, Ohio. These second-generation Norwegian immigrants, and their children, gradually grew the company, and it now includes more than 25 small-circulation newspapers in 11 states. Although Wick Communications is not even among the top 25 newspaper chains, these publications are important in their communities. A typical homepage for the website of Wick-run Wenatchee World, in central Washington State, includes headlines like “Two More Fatalities from COVID-19 Reported in Chelan and Douglas Counties” and “Former Health Administrator Emails Reveal Infighting over Pandemic Response.” There are no big TV stations or metro dailies that provide this kind of coverage. If these newspapers went away, places like Wenatchee would become news deserts.
Even before COVID-19 hit, the Wick papers were seeing rapidly declining advertising revenue. It was clear to 39-year-old Francis, now the CEO, that they had to move rapidly to build up their digital subscriptions. But when the pandemic arrived, the floor fell out. Before the Paycheck Protection Program gave their company a few months of breathing room, the entire chain (like many others) was in danger of becoming insolvent. Wick fears that as PPP expires, and local economies struggle, the papers will continue to be in a dire situation.
Their plight reflects a larger crisis. Journalism—the only profession mentioned in the Bill of Rights—is in a perilous state. Since 2004, the number of newspaper reporters has dropped by more than 60 percent. Some 200 counties and 1,800 communities have no local news source at all. Thousands of others have so-called ghost newspapers, which contain barely any local reporting. One study found that only 17 percent of the articles in local newspapers were about local matters. . . .
Wick is still optimistic that chains like his can figure out permanent, sustainable models, but it will take time, so the government would need to help. He figures that the revenue of local news primarily comes from readers and advertisers, and wonders if there is a way to help newspapers through those primary stakeholders. This past April, he wrote to his local member of Congress, Ann Kirkpatrick of Arizona, suggesting a few ideas. First, provide a $250 tax credit with which Americans would buy newspaper subscriptions. Residents would become better informed, and news organizations would get more revenue, but only if they convinced people it’s worthwhile to subscribe. . . .
It is now possible to imagine a government strategy that would save local news without endangering editorial freedom. That’s crucial, because we are entering into a “third epoch” of local journalism, and the choices we make now—including about public policy—will determine what local news looks like for decades. The first period was what historians have called the era of the partisan press. During this time, which lasted from the nation’s founding years to roughly the Civil War, local newspapers relied on support from political parties and government for much of their revenue. This was followed by the era of commercial journalism, running into the early years of the 21st century, a time when local papers prospered from advertising and government support became less important. That era is over. . . .
Some owners have charted an innovative new approach. In recent years, the owners of The Salt Lake Tribune and The Philadelphia Inquirer donated their newspapers to nonprofit organizations. The Tampa Bay Times (formerly the St. Petersburg Times) was donated to one in 2003. These outlets have maintained much better coverage and have a better path to sustainability than most commercial papers. . . .
Sometimes a local benevolent billionaire reclaims a newspaper from one of the chains. Thanks to purchases by the rich, The Boston Globe, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, The Berkshire Eagle, and the Los Angeles Times have all been investing more in journalism than their chain-based peers. These publications have more runway to make the kinds of decisions that will help them in the long run—for instance, generating more of their revenue through digital subscriptions, rather than advertising, and eventually phasing down print publications. And even if they don’t get all the way into the black, the benefactor covers the gap, in effect offering accountability reporting to the community as a philanthropic donation. . . .
There you have it—a public policy strategy that could save local news but do it in a way that is future—and First Amendment—friendly. If there came a day when the nonprofits were clearly better than the for-profits, people could shift from subscribing to newspapers to donating to nonprofits—or vice versa. It would keep political appointees from being able to use these funds to manipulate local media. Best of all, it would reward and amplify efforts that treat local reporting as a public good. This era of civic news would become not so much a way to fill the gaps created by the collapse of the previous models, but a way to build a far better system of local news than we have ever had before.
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Steven Waldman is the president and co-founder of Report for America, an initiative of The GroundTruth Project. He is the author of Sacred Liberty: America’s Long, Bloody, and Ongoing Struggle for Religious Freedom. As senior adviser to the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, he was the prime author of the landmark report Information Needs of Communities.
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