A new mission, answering a question: How do rural communities sustain journalism that serves local democracy?
By Al Cross
The Institute for Rural
Journalism and Community Issues has a new mission, to answer the question we
posed at our second National Summit on Journalism in Rural America last June:
How do rural communities sustain journalism that serves local democracy?
So, this column, which we started
almost 12 years ago as a guide to covering rural issues, using examples from
The Rural Blog, has a new name: Sustaining Rural Journalism. It will continue
to draw from issue stories on the blog, which increasingly focuses on the
practice of rural journalism and how it can adapt to the new media landscape.
One encouraging trend in rural
journalism is the purchase of quality newspapers by relatively small chains or
individuals that appear committed to editorial quality. Recent examples include
Steve and Cynthia Haynes’ sale of their northwest Kansas papers to the Mullen
brothers of Deer Lodge, Mont.; Cherry Road Media’s purchases of several Gannett
Co. papers; and Cherry Road’s sale of the Cassville (Mo.) Democrat to Editor
Kyle Troutman. The Rural Blog spotlighted them in one of our news-media
roundups at https://tinyurl.com/2zvmc2ye.
Earlier, at tinyurl.com/3y3vy2yt, we
noted the Wagner family’s purchase of the Carroll Times Herald and the
Jefferson Herald in Iowa.
Another trend in rural newspapers
is nonprofit status or purchase by a public benefit corporation, the route taken
by the local buyers of two weeklies in Northern California. A PBC allows the owners
to make a profit while being obliged to operate in the public interest, and in
a responsible and sustainable manner. We took note of it at tinyurl.com/mtcevpaz.
Diversification of your business
is another way to sustain your journalism. One of America’s best weeklies, The
Pilot of Southern Pines, N.C., has community service as its core mission,
Editor John Nagy wrote recently. Publisher David Woronoff has diversified into
“a family of five magazines across the state, a full-service marketing agency,
a telephone directory, a bookstore and a series of digital entities,” such as
newsletters. Read our Rural Blog item at tinyurl.com/4mx7dbas.
Report for America is trying to
help rural newsrooms, and its boss, Steven Waldman, has a good understanding of
community news media. At the recent Society of Professional Journalists
convention, he said local papers are important not just for accountability
reporting, but for "the nature of community itself," creating
community identity and helping community members know each other. You and I
know that, but it’s nice to hear it from a Columbia University graduate who did
most of his journalism in Washington.
Waldman,
who also heads the Rebuild Local News Coalition, said the future of local news
rests on a three-legged stool: changes in public policy, increases in
philanthropic support, and improvement of the local news product. He told the
audience of student and professional journalists that there has "long been
a sense that community journalism is where you cut your teeth" and qualify
to move up, but "I've kind of flipped on that . . . Community journalism,
given what's going on in our country right now, is almost as important as
accountability journalism."
At the same SPJ session, Cox
Newspapers retiree Andy Alexander, who heads a foundation that supports
reporting projects in the Rappahannock News of Washington, Va., said many
people don't realize what narrow margins rural papers have: "You're being
published, so you must be all right; it's very close to the line." Alexander
said the locally owned weekly and the foundation have more stories than people
to do them, so they are training citizens to be reporters. "There are a
lot of people out there who can cover news on the margins," he said.
Our
summary of the SPJ session is at tinyurl.com/dx7ryhca.
Newspapers need contributing writers of all
kinds, for facts and opinion. I’d like to see more rural papers run pieces by
natives who have overcome obstacles and set examples to follow, like this one
from an Appalachian scholar who went “from a trailer park in a small town to a
two-story house in a subdivision.” The Rural Blog has the whole thing at tinyurl.com/324562cy.
Here are some quick takes on issues
and topics featured recently on The Rural Blog:
The Federal Communications
Commission has new broadband maps that will help determine who will share in the
big raft of federal money to expand high-speed internet, but the maps still
depend on questionable information from telecommunications companies. They can
be challenged, but the deadline is Jan. 13. tinyurl.com/aee86jvc
See lots of unfamiliar names in
that list of new teachers at a school board meeting? Might be a good idea to
see how well their backgrounds were checked; many misbehaving teachers move
from district to district and state to state undiscovered. tinyurl.com/ywreky3r
Is there an effort to ban books
in your local libraries? It may have support from outside your community. tinyurl.com/mvu2ct4h
Your rural hospital may choose to
avoid closure by becoming a glorified first-aid station. tinyurl.com/3udcayw7
Does your community have a federally
qualified health center (generally called “community health center”)? Check to
see if federal taxpayers paid settlements or judgments in malpractice lawsuits
on its behalf, to whom and how much. tinyurl.com/4p6d23w2
Your local governments will be
getting money from a national opioid settlement, but it may not come close to
making up for the damage done by the drugs. tinyurl.com/3z7rbv57
Will any of your local farmers
benefit from the 141 “climate smart” grants that the Department of Agriculture
has issued? tinyurl.com/2p8w2j7b
Worried that your local electric
substations may become targets of attacks? Here’s background information: tinyurl.com/yck9kne8
Every weekday, The Rural Blog is
updated with four to six stories on rural issues and rural journalism. Read it
at http://irjci.blogspot.com.
Al
Cross edited and managed rural newspapers before covering politics for the
Louisville Courier Journal and serving as president of the Society of
Professional Journalists. He directs the University of Kentucky’s Institute for
Rural Journalism and Community Issues, which is seeking a new director as he
heads into retirement. For more information, contact him at al.cross@uky.edu.
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