Regular readers of this column know I’m a career newspaperman. I’ve traveled a lot of our country during the past four decades spreading all the news that’s fit to print.
For the most part, it’s been a great ride.
During the past several years or so, however, the industry, in general, has struggled. Social media has given people a venue to spread a ton of lies and misinformation that contradicts the truth and facts contained in your local newspaper.
It’s become a battle to print the truth and the facts while others do differently.
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg as seemingly more and more folks simply don’t care about what’s going on around them and believe they don’t need the local newspaper and its headlines of the day.
That couldn’t be more wrong and can’t be further from the truth.
All this is pretty scary to someone like me who has invested his life and career to reporting those facts that contain that truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. And I’m very proud to say that in all that time, I’ve always been straight as an arrow down the middle – and so has my paper – no matter what anyone may believe to the contrary.
It still tickles me that in the same week I can receive a comment from someone that says we’re too liberal and from another that says we’re too conservative.
Go figure. That really must mean we’re doing things quite well.
Anyway, I recently read a study published by the Medill School of Journalism, one of the most prestigious journalism schools in the country. Its executive summary stated there is a growing division in the United States between communities that have a true source of local news and those that don’t, adding a fifth of our population lives in a “news desert” or in a community at risk of becoming one.
“We can define news deserts as a place where residents in a community have very limited access to the sort of news and information that helps them make good everyday decisions, as well as good decisions that will affect the long-term quality of life of future generations,” said Penny Abernathy, the primary author of the report, during an “E&P Reports” vodcast interview. “Without access to credible information on issues such as education, health, the economy and the environment, people cannot determine what choices will positively impact them.”
Bingo. That credible information is the local newspaper – in this case, your Boerne Star.
In other words, our country is continuing to lose newspapers, as well as the critical education and information they provide, and most struggling communities that lose a paper are not getting a reliable print or digital replacement.
Even worse, that loss of local journalism has been accompanied by the malignant spread of misinformation and disinformation, political polarization, eroding trust in media and a yawning digital and economic divide among citizens, the report found, adding that in communities without a credible source of local news, voter participation declines, corruption in both government and business increases and local residents end up paying more in taxes and at checkout.
“This is a crisis for our democracy and our society,” the report reads.
I agree.
“I believe this is the most crucial issue facing the news industry, and one of the most crucial issues facing our democracy, right now, is the availability of local news and information,” said the senior associate dean of the Medill School, Tim Franklin, who oversaw the research report.
Take a second here to think of the vast news desert around here if there were no Boerne Star! …
The study revealed that newspapers are continuing to vanish at a rapid rate with an average of more than two a week disappearing.
Since 2005, the country has lost more than a fourth of its newspapers (2,500) and is on track to lose a third by 2025. Even though the pandemic was not the catastrophic “extinction-level event” some feared, the country lost more than 360 newspapers between the waning pre-pandemic months of late 2019 and the end of May 2022. All but 24 of those papers were weeklies, serving communities ranging in size from a few hundred people to tens of thousands. At the time of the report, the country had 6,377 surviving papers: 1,230 dailies and 5,147 weeklies.
Also, the surviving newspapers have cut staff and circulation significantly as print revenues and profits have evaporated. Since 2005, when newspaper revenues topped $50 billion, overall newspaper employment has dropped 70 percent as revenues declined to $20 billion. Newsroom employment has declined by almost 60 percent.
“Strong local news helps us understand those whose experiences and attitudes are different from us, and, in the process, brings us together to solve our most pressing political, economic and social problems,” the report reads. “It binds our vast nation of 330 million people together, nurturing both democracy and community. Everyone in the country has a stake in the future of local news, in whatever form it is delivered.”
Well said.
That, my friends, is why The Boerne Star remains and continues to position itself to be your best local news and information source. That’s why we work so very hard day in and day out. We’re as much a part of this county and our communities as anything and anyone else – and our importance is more essential than ever.
Again, our importance is more essential than ever!
As long as I’m at the newsroom helm, we will continue to be the best source of local news and provide you with the best variety and cross-section of information. And our switching to the weekend print and online edition later this month while still proving a midweek online product will solidify that even further.
Remember, we’re The Boerne Star – your hometown newspaper. And, we’re local yesterday, today and tomorrow.
In short, you need us, more than ever – and we need you.
A subscriber recently told me, “Please continue to keep us apprised since I don’t know where else to find that info other than The Star.”
We will.
As always, thanks for reading.
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