A sobering report came out the other week. The headline said it all:
LOSING THE NEWS: The Decimation of Local Journalism and the Search for Solutions.
Here's the takeaway:
Since 2004, nearly 1,800 newspapers have closed, leaving American towns and cities—sometimes entire counties—without a meaningful source of local reporting. And the pace of closures is only accelerating as tech giants siphon off much of the ad revenue that once sustained the media industry. Other local news sources (TV, radio stations) continue to see widespread consolidation under conglomerates that lean on one-size-fits-all national news, the very sort of news now widely distrusted. But while Americans still trust their local news sources, what many don’t realize is just how much these outlets are struggling.
You can read the entire report here.
It's media in the small gateway towns around many national parks that long have reported on these incredible places. As they disappear, so does much of the coverage of the national parks. National outlets such as CNN, The Washington Post, the New York Times and such don't routinely cover the National Park System. But National Parks Traveler does, and we're working to fill the void being created by the loss of local media outlets.
As local media outlets fall by the wayside, National Parks Traveler works to fill the void. With your support, we can cover more parks in more detail--Kurt Repanshek, founder and editor-in-chief
In recent weeks, we've provided detailed coverage of the spaceport proposed to be built near Cumberland Island National Seashore, a facility that would send rockets over the seashore. While there was national attention to three cows being washed out to sea by Hurricane Dorian and later appearing at Cape Lookout National Seashore, Traveler examined how Dorian sliced up Cape Lookout with a 9-foot wall of water. We also reported in some detail about archaeological theft from Ozark National Scenic Riverways.
We strive to keep in mind local audiences, and appreciate that while you might live in California, you love news on Everglades National Park, or though you might hail from Maine, you want to know what's going on at Saguaro National Park. It's why we run stories about campground openings, damage inflicted on lighthouses at Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, Mammoth Cave National Park closing two tour routes for almost two years for repairs, and the sale of a concessionaire that operates in Acadia National Park, Death Valley National Park, Muir Woods National Monument, and Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
There are 419 units of the National Park System, and each has a passionate fan base. We get that. That's why our coverage in just the past two weeks has touched not just on Yellowstone, Saguaro, Grand Canyon, and Mammoth Cave, but also Arkansas Post, Wright Brothers National Memorial, Bryce Canyon, Hawai'i Volcanoes, Gettysburg, Zion, Gulf Islands, Big Thicket, Big Bend, Grand Teton, Hot Springs and more.
As you know, National Parks Traveler is free. There's no subscription fee, no paywall. We believe coverage of national parks and protected areas should reach the widest possible audience. With your support, we can expand that coverage with more in-depth coverage of more parks on a regular basis.
Help keep the news coming with a donation. If you prefer not to use PayPal, your check can reach us at P.O. Box 980452, Park City, UT, 84098.
National Parks Traveler, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit media organization, depends on reader and listener support to produce stories such as this one and other coverage of national parks and protected areas. Please donate today to ensure this coverage continues.
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Comments
Kurt, love the reporting you do on the parks. Currently, I serve in the US Army (Active Duty) and I and my family only are able to visit a National Park once a year or every other year if that. Army Schedule is too busy and currently on rotation to Germany. So true about the major news networks (crickets about our National Parks). Too concerned with impeachment. As a conservative it makes me sick inside for the state of affairs in our parks. Congress is still arguing over LWCF funding. Even with my families busy schedule as we serve this great country, we still find time to purchase duck stamps for our children in supporting conservation, add a donation to park services when visiting a park, volunteer planting trees, at times donating some of our funds to land conservation initiatives so select/pristine public lands are not paved over with housing developments, etc.
Anyway, Kurt we appreciate your reporting on the parks. Keep at it. For many of us whether conservative, libertarian, liberal, or progressive National Park Traveller is all we have. So sad main stream news can’t/won’t report on our great natural heritage. I also appreciate the comment sections. In the end we are all American. Great work. I and my family will seriously consider donating to National Park Traveller.
I used to deliver (and later write for) one of those missing 1800 newspapers--the Binghamton [New York] Sun, and later Sun-Bulletin. It then merged with the Evening Press and is now the Binghamton Press & Sun Bulletin, and, getting to what I believe is Kurt's point, became the only newspaper in town. The same is true here in Seattle, where the Post-Intelligencer is defunct. It is just the Seattle Times these days, and, even with the Post-Intelligencer gone, the Times struggles to maintain a daily circulation one third the size--about 150,000 a day. I used to write for both of those papers, as well, all of it op-eds.
So, who (or what?) is to blame here? Where are all of those missing readers? Today, probably watching NFL footfall, despite horrendous interludes between every play. Got to get those commercials in! Got to give even the kicker $10 million a year. Fifty years ago, television did not rule our lives. Or social media. We read newspapers--and we had reporters--reporting from every angle of every issue. Today, I would bet the Moon that any op-ed I would write for any mainstream, blue-city newspaper would not be acknowledged, let alone printed--since even the slightest hint of anything "conservative" would doom my submission from the start.
Example: Several months ago, I wrote and submitted an op-ed to a major blue-state newspaper on the presence of children in casinos. You would think that every blue state (should it matter which one?) would not want children even close to a gambling establishment. How wrong I was. Apparently, the latest liberal argument is that casinos are "family friendly." It's where minority families in particular go to "have fun." We would not want to deny minority children this opportunity, would we?
What is really going on? Here's my take. Practically every state in the country now has legalized gambling. It is above criticism in the eyes of the press. After all, it is above criticism in the eyes of The Establishment. And now the media is just part of The Establishment. We need legalized gambling to avoid raising taxes--same as we need a $10 tax on a pack of cigarettes. If children suffer because their parents gamble too much, well, we can at least say that casinos are "family friendly" and avoid the problem for another decade or two.
What amazes me is not that 1800 newspapers have disappeared; rather, what amazes me is that any survive at all. At its core, the job of a reporter is to inform. Most no longer inform; they rather indict. They don't describe the action; they rather pick a side, here in Seattle, recently to condemn the verdict of the voters on I-976 (look it up) because the majortiy voting for it happened to be from outside Seattle, and therefore of no consequence to the circulation of the Seattle Times.
The Governor, the legislature (Seattle-elected, that is), the Attorney General, the Seattle Mayor and City Council--all call the STATE voters a bunch of fools. And you wonder why Hillary Clinton isn't president? And you wonder why America's newspapers are bleeding to death? Wonder not, but yes, do subscribe to the Traveler. If it should disappear you can bet that no one at The New York Times will pick up the slack--or any other blue-state newspaper in the land.
Local reporting hasn't gone away, it has mearly changed medium. Social media (including NPT) is far more extensive and timely than those 1800 print outlets ever where. Maybe not as reliable as years ago but far more reliable than the main stream media outlets that remain today. I will take NPT over the NYT or WashPo or Newsweek any day.
The Post-Intelligencer is still around in an online-only format. They pretty much had to do it once the they ended their joint-operating agreement. Hearst still runs it where it looks similar to other Hearst online publications and occasionally has filler material from other Hearst online publications. Hearst has been on the other end too where they bought the San Francisco Chronicle and then shed the San Francisco Examiner. The Examiner used to be William Hearst's baby.
While reading y_p_w's comment, I went back and reread mine. Let me make it clear that when I talked about the social media outlets not being reliable, that was a comment about social media in general, not a comment specific to NPT. In fact, quite the contrary, I find NPT to be very reliable. Many other sites, left & right - not so much. That is why I always like to go back to the source material and not rely on believing what someone else tells me to believe.
Mark it in red - Mr Buck and I agree on one thing --- NPT is a very reliable news source.
Otherewise I read the local Concrete Herald, and the local community releases that are read on the air during my community radio show [Upriver Currents]. My wife gets the ["not failing"] NYT Sunday edition. I do have an incredible bookmark list of websites both leftish and rightish. At this point in my life I trust myself and my own judgement on wheat/chaff sorting.