HOT PURSUIT
For years, newspapers have survived from a business model of subscriptions and advertising revenue, mostly from businesses.
The old conventional wisdom that newspaper publishers have operated under for decades is that subscriptions pay for the postage and printing of the newspaper and advertising covers everything else from payroll to keeping the lights on.
Unfortunately, somewhere along the way that business model has gone array and doesn’t work any longer. There are many factors that have caused this to happen. One of the first is the postage rates, which just this month went up again for newspapers. I don’t even want to keep track of this, but last I saw the rates for newspaper postage have skyrocketed 40% in the last three years. It’s out of control. And, of course, as most of you know, the postal service keeps getting worse.
It's not a secret that the state of local news across the country is in crisis. Many newspapers have failed. And that’s a threat to democracy as people become disconnected with their communities and don’t know what’s going on. Misinformation is often running rampant due to social media.
The Times is fighting back as much as we can to keep local news at the forefront and relevant in the communities we serve. It’s a tough challenge, but one that we feel is necessary to keep newspapers from becoming extinct. From the business end, the battle we face is finding other revenue sources to supplement the declining income widely seen throughout the industry from subscriptions and ads.
Last week I attended a panel discussion sponsored by Report for America in Minneapolis. A room of journalists, media industry leaders, philanthropists and other supporters of local journalism heard about growing statewide support for local news in Minnesota.
Recognizing that the old ways of funding like I outlined earlier are no longer viable, the newspaper industry is joining a growing movement to find “outside” funding sources for local news. This will likely include partnering with nonprofit organizations in the communities as well as finding philanthropists to commit money to local journalism. Doing so is going into uncharted territory for most newspapers.
Finding outside help is already happening. For instance, Florida-based McKnight Foundation envisions vibrant journalism as a cornerstone of American democracy by committing at least $500 million over five years for local news. Currently programs are being unveiled in which news organizations can take advantage of the funds.
There is also some talk about possible funding coming from the state and federal government in the near future. For decades, government has often bailed out struggling industries. However, to this point, the media industry has not received any help from the government except for the pandemic which was made available to all businesses. It only seems appropriate that government would help keep an industry tied to the country’s democracy thriving.
At last week’s panel journalists were challenged to do a better job at educating community members about the state of local journalism. While we love covering our communities, there is often a disconnect in which average citizens and organizations within the communities don’t understand that there is a price to pay for the local community news we offer. It doesn’t help when groups cut the newspaper out of paid advertising for their events.
As local newsrooms have disappeared across America, communities have witnessed fading civic engagement, eroding social bonds and surging misinformation, most often thanks to social media. The bottom line is that democracy flourishes when people have access to reliable information.
Even on our local level, we need to come together to engage in conversations around the goal of increasing investments in local news. We must find community members and other funders who care about the health of their local news ecosystems and their communities.
It’s something we all have an obligation to go in hot pursuit of reinvigorating local news for years to come.