A Plan to Save Local News
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n the early 2000’s, there was a guy who wore a Mexican ski mask to protect his identity while attending City Council meetings in Bell, California. Bell is a close-in Los Angeles suburb, and one of the smallest cites in America--by geography, only two and a half square miles. And it’s home to only 37,000 residents; in other words, little more than half an average NFL crowd. It’s hardly a place you’d expect to find huge news. But the masked guy dutifully kept track of what was going on in Bell and reported what he saw on his own web site. Once in a while, he’d also call the LA Times and leave messages to let them know, too. But no one really paid attention.
Then, in 2010, two Times reporters were assigned to look into the fact that a neighboring suburb was offloading all its city services to Bell to handle. And they remembered what the Mexican mask guy had said about inflated salaries in Bell. So, they started making calls and asking for records.
We can jump right to the bottom line. The reporters found out that while one city councilman was making $8,000 a year--which seemed reasonable—somehow every other council member was taking home ten times as much. And the city manager made $1.5 million a year in pay and benefits—more than any city manager in the U.S. And he was also somehow in line to receive an annual pension of $880,000 when he left.
Because reporters finally paid attention, all that went away. The city manager won a 12-year prison sentence. The Times reporters won Pulitzer Prizes.
But there’s an important footnote. It so happens that the local newspaper, which had long covered Bell, went out of business just about the time this corrupt city manager arrived. Local news there had effectively disappeared. It’s impossible to say that the scandal never would have happened if the paper had lived…but maybe?
Veteran California journalism advocate Terry Francke says, “the Bell spectacle is what happens to communities without their old-fashioned diligent news coverage by veteran newspaper reporters, or at least reporters led by veteran newspaper editors.”
This is something worth preserving.
You and the News
Think about what happens when you consume your local news--via print, broadcast or online. First, you find out things about your community you didn’t know. That alone is worth a lot, since without your local outlets, your sources would consist of rumor, speculation, and what someone told your brother-in-law down at the bar. Next, you begin to mentally spool that information--you start to think. Then, since your friends and neighbors have probably seen the same reporting, you might start talking to them. These conversations frequently begin with something like, “hey, did you hear about…?” You exchange opinions--maybe you agree, maybe you don’t. Finally, based on all this, you decide your position--and ultimately, how you’re going to vote.
Pretty cool, isn’t it? The first amendment breathes. Democracy lives.
Unfortunately, the “lungs” of local news are breaking down. Communities are gasping for air. In many places, local news has already passed away.
But keep hope. By the time we’re finished here, we’ll look at some success stories…and propose a broad solution.
The Situation
My first newspaper was the Chicago Daily News. It was the third horse (by circulation) in a four-paper town. It published just six days a week, not bothering to slug it out on Sundays with the big boys (the Tribune and the Sun-Times). But even without the Sunday revenue bonanza of classified ads, help-wanteds and real estate listings, it did just fine. Its news operation was robust and legendary. It not only ran its own large Washington bureau, it also employed its own reporters full time roaming foreign capitals. Locally, its coverage was so entwined with Chicago that its City Hall beat reporter wound up marrying the city’s first female mayor. The Daily News was into everything.
Today the Daily News is long gone. Thousands of other papers have followed. Professor Penny Muse Abernathy at the University of North Carolina helped popularize the notion of “news deserts”-- places where a local newspaper simply doesn’t exist. She reports that over the last 15 years, about 2,000 newspapers have disappeared, 60 of them local dailies—that’s an average of two-and-a-half lost per week. More than 200 entire counties are now news deserts.
More to the point, in this same period since 2004, the total number of journalists employed by American newspapers has been cut in half.
Fortunately for me, my small local newspaper continues to publish. And because of that, when I opened a recent issue I learned:
Office workers in my school district are facing possible salary cuts.
Our local “community court” just graduated its first “class”. The court “hears cases” of women arrested for minor crimes like theft, but who prosecutors and public defenders agree to divert from the formal justice system. They’re sent directly to counselling. One of the graduates from the program found health care, housing and a job in just a month—when she otherwise would have been awaiting trial—or maybe even sitting in jail. Instead, her criminal charges were dismissed. Huh.
Another woman from my area will represent our state in the national Mrs. Universe contest. (Note: “Mrs.” not “Miss”.) She’s an immigrant mother from India with masters and doctorate degrees. She entered the pageant to build recognition for a foundation her family started after her sister died from a drug overdose. She does not fit the traditional profile of a “beauty queen.” Double huh.
These are things I’d never know without diligent but poorly paid reporters doing their jobs. No major outlet where I live would have covered any of these hyper-local stories. While news deserts logically exist in low-density rural areas, they’re also increasingly common in the suburbs that ring major cities. A news desert can spring up anywhere.
The Living Dead
In truth, the outright shuttering of local papers is only half the problem. What’s more distressing is the hollowing out of many larger metropolitan news organizations that continue to exist—but in a far less robust form than during their glory days. This includes both the big dailies and local broadcast news outlets.
Their troubles developed in opposite directions.
In television, a rating point is the simple percentage of all TV households in a viewing area tuned to a specific cable or broadcast outlet at any one time. In the heyday of local TV news, a weekday evening or late-night newscast might register a 12 or sometimes even an 18 rating. In the Midwest, at 10pm more than half of TVs were typically tuned to some local news outlet.
Today it’s entirely different. In some upscale markets, where more people rely on online sources, those same local newscasts are often recording a single rating point. Cable and streaming services stole the viewers. And thus, what happened next was predictable: fewer eyeballs led to fewer advertisers; fewer ads led to less revenue; less revenue led to fewer people covering the news. Viewers left…and the advertisers followed.
For print, the sequence was backwards—the advertisers left first. The pervasive and broad reach of online meant a much richer environment to reach anyone wanting to find a nanny, rent an apartment or buy a used car. Can you imagine trying to run an ever-changing Craigslist in print? Impossible.
In the end, the result for both print and broadcast was the same: fewer reporters and newer reporters; less depth and less breadth. Coverage shrank. Today, city and county councils…even state legislatures and state governments…often go about their business all but hidden from the electorate. As local news staffs and skill sets decline, it’s already hard to remember that high-quality local news once existed.
The Beat Does Not Go On
George Orwell said, “If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”
This pretty much describes the traditional job of the journalist. Anything investigated and reported will be welcomed by some—and lambasted by others. Claims of “fake news” are hardly new.
Now consider the position of the reporter. How do you find out the things people don’t want you to know? Information that many citizens need…but which might vilify you in the eyes of others? In a world where most workers realize their jobs are dependent on keeping quiet, how do you get people to talk?
The time-honored answer is the “source”--someone who will fill you in, often confidentially. But how in the world do you gain that source’s trust in the first place?
Traditionally, such sources are developed on a “beat” --a focal point of coverage where a reporter specializes in things like the environment or business or local government. A place where contact with sources happens almost daily.
In Seattle, a broadcast journalist (and local legend) named Mike James recalls how he worked a beat early in his long career—and how that served his community (please click below):
(Mike James has much wisdom to impart on the current state of the news business, and what it means for democracy. For more from him, please view a full video interview in “Someone You Should Know”, or via the separate post on the home page.)
Well, at this point I wouldn’t blame you for concluding, “OK, fine, I’m sure the good old days were great. The news was better. But you’ve already told me the old business models for local print and broadcast don’t work anymore, so why even bring all this up?”
Here’s the answer: in fact, some local news operations are making money. But forces beyond market demand and ad rates are making everything far worse. The real mess started when the vultures came home to roost.
Enter the Vultures
Many purchases of local news outlets are being made by hedge funds and private equity firms. There is no assurance these new owners will maintain the previous staff or facilities. They may actually oppose the traditional role of journalism, or at least dismiss its importance.
(For detail on how exactly this can play out, I would refer you to the most-read piece ever to appear in the Cascade Review. It’s Meet the Enemy: Heath Freeman. If you haven’t seen it, please do, because it demonstrates this entire “vulture” mentality).
Just because you buy into the news business doesn’t mean you have one bit of concern for news, public interest, or even democracy. For many, profit is the only point. The business plan then is simple: pillage…sell off…and move on.
Often the sole motivation for purchasing a local news outlet is to acquire the building where the organization is housed, and the real estate on which it sits. Such newsrooms are quickly moved to different (often outlying) locations, and the original land is sold off to developers. Owners have now accomplished their main mission.
At the same time, many veteran journalists discover their jobs have changed in a profound way. They are now being judged in no small part by their social media profiles. Who follows them becomes as important as the news they follow.
Currently, much industry takeover talk centers on the announced merger of two already large news conglomerates, GateHouse Media and Gannett (the latter the publisher of USA Today). Together, the new company would own more than 250 daily newspapers in 47 states. The principals forecast savings of $300 million by eliminating duplicate operations. So far, they’re saying the right things about, “continuing to invest in newsrooms.” But others have said the same thing. We’ll see.
To be sure, the vultures are constantly circling communities. But do Americans even notice? Do they care?
Actually, we do.
What We Fear
One of tentpoles of American journalism is the Nieman Foundation at Harvard University. Its goal is to “promote and elevate the standards” of the profession. In that vein, Nieman also conducts surveys.
Recently, it asked citizens what concerns them most about the idea of a large, out-of-market corporation buying and operating a local news outlet. The respondents listed “very concerneds” for out-of-town ownership in the following order:
· 66%: would “influence the fairness of coverage” with their “own personal views”
· 35%: would “include more news that’s not unique (to) the area”
· 33%: would “spend less on news gathering than…the previous owners”.
Yep, we do get it. But on that first fear above, what’s behind this whole “fairness of coverage” thing?
No doubt, long-held assertions of “liberal bias” come into play here. But more to the point, many understand and may have already observed the weight of right-wing thumbs on the scales of local news balance. Our Scott Miller wrote about a prime example, Sinclair Broadcasting, and how they’ve imposed lockstep repetition of GOP and Trumpian talking points across their 191 news stations.
OK, but isn’t “lockstep” a bit dramatic? Well, take a look at this Deadspin video which demonstrates what’s going on.
In the ultimate irony, this “must-run” content warns viewers of exactly the type of perverse journalism that these dead-eyed anchor-bots are practicing.
Identifying the Threat
Abernathy at UNC has stated, “the fate of communities and local news organizations are intrinsically linked, journalistically and economically. Trust and credibility suffer as local news media are lost.”
She is not alone. Several foundations are sounding the alarm.
I asked the opinion of Rick Edmonds, the media business reporter at a legendary news think tank in Florida called the Poynter Institute. He told me, “it’s absolutely a reason for concern. Some statehouses are barely covered at all. This is on balance a pretty bad thing. If we keep going on this same course, in five years it’s not only going to be a little bad for democracy, it’s going to be really bad for democracy. I just don’t think it’s a sure thing that the situation can be turned around.”
So, OK, time for a little optimism.
Where It’s Working
If the names Glen Taylor and Patrick Soon-Shiong don’t ring a bell, that’s not surprising. Neither came from fame or royalty.
Taylor was born on a Minnesota farm, served as a state senator, and wound up on the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans. He’s also owner of both the Minneapolis Timberwolves of the NBA, and the Minnesota Lynx WNBA team.
Soon-Shiong was born to Chinese parents living in South Africa. Today he is both a heart surgeon and CEO of a health care company in Los Angeles, with an estimated net worth of $7+ billion. He’s also part owner of the L.A. Lakers of the NBA.
But their connection here has nothing to do with mere wealth or basketball. Specifically, each is now owner of a big city newspaper. And both believe their papers are going to survive, and maybe even thrive.
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Taylor’s Minneapolis Star-Tribune includes full coverage from four unique geographical regions surrounding the Twin Cities—suburbs there are not ignored. “Local news” extends beyond city limits. But that doesn’t come cheap. Taylor bought the Star-Tribune in 2014 out of civic concern, without expectation that it would become a huge revenue driver. He said at the time:
“I will buy it and there will be enough money generated for it to pay for itself. The other reason…is probably that I am leading with my heart a little bit. This (paper) was going to be sold, and I don’t know that…anybody else in Minnesota…said they were interested. Other newspaper chains…could have taken headquarters away from here. And when that happens, it isn’t as strong of a group.”
Today, it is a strong group. Industry observers joke that planes landing in Minneapolis are filled with news execs from other markets anxious to figure out just how the Star-Tribune is getting all this done.
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When Patrick Soon-Shiong bought the LA Times last year, the paper was teetering. Its Chicago-based sellers had slashed staff. Morale sagged. Countless decades of local expertise walked out the door, clutching pink slips or early retirement offers. Today, the newsroom is filled with a different type of disbelief.
Soon-Shiong says, with his paper, “I’m looking at a hundred-year plan, literally.” And he sees his investment not strictly as a business, but as,
“…an institutional public trust in a private setting. Journalists love the idea of discovery, of finding news, understanding it…they are passionate about what they do. It’s got nothing to do with (a) business analysis. It’s got to do with an analysis of what’s important for humanity.”
Yes, “humanity.”
I will pause here for a moment to let any old-time journalist deal with that lump in your throat.
An Outdated Solution
In one sense, the idea of a news “desert” seems preposterous. After all, there’s news everywhere, right? Turn on the TV, any time of day, and you’ll find multiple sources of news and opinion on what’s happening in the world. And that doesn’t begin to consider the countless number of online options—just like this one--that attempt to let you know about things they think really matter.
But most of these available sources deal with the country as a whole…or the world at large. Certainly, the escapades of your nationally elected officials are important. And likewise, those in other countries.
But does any of that tell you the backgrounds of who’s running for your local city council?
There’s got to be something that will irrigate these deserts—that will assure that you know what’s happening in your local community.
Once upon a time, the Associated Press promised to be that source—all news to all people. Since before the Civil War it’s been jointly funded by other news organizations to make sure that things that should get covered do get covered. In addition, since 1848, it’s been the tabulator of ballots from federal, state and local elections. It distributes news in English, Spanish and Arabic. Online aggregators like Yahoo! and Microsoft deploy the AP as a primary news source. It even provides rankings of college football and basketball powerhouses. It rushes to breaking news anywhere. The AP has won 53 Pulitzer Prizes. It’s justifiably proud.
But it also needs to make ends meet. So, think about its funding structure. If newspaper and broadcast contributions are what keeps the AP alive…what happens when those newspapers and broadcast entities begin to deflate or disappear? Where do the contributions come from? The AP today slants toward national news, international breaking news, and investigations with a wide focus.
AP does not send reporters to cover negotiations between my city and the local waste management company; it doesn’t let me know if my garbage is going to be collected. Sure, a citizen could cover the meetings, then call the AP to let them know what’s going happening.
But not in my big city. No one would answer the phone. Our AP office shut down two years ago.
We need something better.
A New Solution
My Dad used to say that the easiest thing in the world is spending other people’s money. So that’s exactly what I’m going to propose.
Here’s the general idea behind it…beginning with the goal:
An independent news organization whose mission is the coverage of America, community by community.
The deployment of reporters everywhere reporters should be, beginning with coverage of county and state governments. While every state capital has a local newspaper, sometimes governmental coverage is confined almost entirely to legislative sessions. State governments need to be staffed 52 weeks a year, and its daily workings reported statewide.
Coverage of local business as well as local government. As advertising dollars become more scarce, the businesses spending those dollars have proportionately more influence over which parts of their operations get covered. Business “watchdogs” are as important as the governmental variety, because the good such journalism can do for the public is just as impactful.
Certainly, no amount of staffing could assure, for example, that every small-town meeting across Montana is personally staffed by a reporter. Nor could it cover every council meeting in the ring of suburbs around every big city. But that’s never been the case. A reporter assigned to a “beat” that incorporates these locales…who makes regular phone calls to ask what’s happening…goes a long way to filling the need.
The resulting coverage lives online. There is no need to invest in printing presses or television studios. Citizens in areas covered could receive digital notifications whenever a new “story” or “edition” is available on their devices.
Who runs the organization?
The equivalent of a board of directors is formed combining the highest levels of journalism experience and non-partisanship. That means representation from:
The vast resource of retired journalists and journalism executives
Highly regarded independent entities like Poynter, Niemann, CJR, Knight, Ford, Gates, MacArthur, Kaiser and others which currently fund quality journalism
The best journalism schools in the country (which would also act as feeders for paid, entry level positions in this new organization)
An executive director who represents the ideals of the organization. He or she would also be directly responsible for selection and oversight of editors assigned to specific geographic or coverage areas
One editor assigned to oversee each separate area; someone with a demonstrated track record, either as an active or retired journalist. This means new life for hundreds of the most talented reporters and editors who have fallen prey to the vultures.
Of course, there are a million details that need addressing. But none of those matters if we don’t answer the most fundamental of questions: who pays for all this?
Where does the money come from?
There are three logical sources: government, foundations and private or corporate concerns.
I’m going to go ahead and take government right off the table. First, governments don’t have the money. And second, there would literally be no end to the squealing about whose bias is being allowed to run things. Proposing this kind of funding is pointless.
Next, foundations. They already do great work, underwriting sources like Frontline on PBS, ProPublica and even some of the investigative reporting that appears in local newspapers. Around the world, journalism receives well over a billion dollars a year from foundations. The downside of all this is that foundations, like businesses, want “bang for the buck”. They like tangible, high profile results. Which is not illogical, but it works against our concern here. The standard that a foundation sets for worthiness would unlikely be met by a reporter in Helena, Montana tracking a recent proposal there that would switch the awarding of liquor licenses from a lottery system to an auction. A foundation wouldn’t care. But many people in Helena do.
So, we are left with the option of what corporate or private wealth could bring us. Self-serving content? Bias? Censorship? These things scare people. Conservatives would point to the “damage” the Sulzberger family has wrought with its New York Times. Liberals would scream about Rupert Murdoch’s creation of Fox News.
The ideal person to underwrite all this would be someone with unlimited wealth…and a track record (not just a promise) of remaining hands-off. In other words, Glen Taylor or Patrick Soon-Shiong on a national scale. But could such a person exist?
In fact, he does.
Amazon News
Yes, I think you see what’s coming. And yes, I can already hear you muttering.
Because yes, I am asking Jeff Bezos to underwrite this essential commitment to democracy…one that delivers full and fair local news coverage to Americans.
Financially, there’s no question he can do it. He’s the richest man in the world.
So, what exactly are we asking him to contribute?
Let’s come up with an entirely arbitrary estimate of $100 million a year—I have no idea if that’s a good number. But in any case, that’s a lot of money. However, it’s less than 1/1000th of his Bezos’ net worth. If he makes even a middling 7% per annum on his fortune, $100 million is a rounding error. He could afford it.
But is he the right guy? I mean, look—he’s personally swallowing all of American retail, isn’t he? And didn’t his company pay nothing in federal income taxes last year? Isn’t he paying his warehouse workers as little as $15/hr.—people walking those warehouse floors up to 20 miles a day? Doesn’t he lord over a corporate culture where every exec is competing in a daily survival of the fittest?
There’s both truth and hyperbole to all of this. But even if true, does that preclude him from being the right guy to fix local news?
Absolutely not.
Consider his stewardship of the Washington Post since buying it in 2013. Shortly afterwards, he explained the purchase by saying,
”It is the newspaper in the capital city of the most important country in the world…(with) an incredibly important role to play in this democracy. When I’m 90, it’s going to be one of the things I’m most proud of…”.
His involvement since purchasing that paper has been twofold. On one hand, he remains actively involved in revamping its business model, applying his deep understanding of data and the Internet.
However, on the journalism side, there is no evidence of him influencing what the Post covers, or how it covers it.
Speaking more recently, he added,
“…my (non-Amazon) areas of focus so far have included investment in the future of our planet and civilization through the development of foundational space infrastructure, (and) support of American democracy through stewardship of the Washington Post…”.
So, there you have it—a very rich man with a proven appreciation for democracy. In other words, the ideal candidate to support development of hundreds of small news bureaus across America to supplement the international news behemoth he already owns. Unleash his data wizards on a problem that transcends consumer choice and quick package delivery. He can make this happen.
Accurate news reporting on either a global or hyper-local scale is vital and equally important. People must be informed of facts. When local news stumbles, democracy heads for a fall. So, Jeff, how about a helping hand?
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With Amazon, Jeff Bezos runs America’s most popular brand. With his intelligence and schooling, he’s certainly learned about his predecessors, the personal superpowers of the Gilded Age a century ago. They, too, stood astride the American business landscape. And he understands how Ford and Carnegie and Rockefeller and Vanderbilt, late in life, attempted to repair their tattered public profiles by pouring money into museums and college buildings and foundations. For them, it was reputational rehabilitation.
eff Bezos doesn’t need that. He doesn’t deserve the mantle of villain. On whole, Americans love what he gives them. And he needn’t wait until late in life to further burnish his image.
He doesn’t need to be remembered merely as the man who reinvented consumer-facing business around the world.
He can also be the man who saves local journalism—and in the process, maybe a democracy.
Have a comment or thought on this? Just hit the Your Turn tab here or email us at mailbox@cascadereview.net to have your say.
