Newspapers' (Literal) Vanishing Acts

It's not our eyes.

We know the page width has been reduced at most papers (and with it, the depth).

We know there are fewer pages in the paper, fewer ads and, yes, fewer, and shorter, stories.

We know there are fewer reporters out there, finding out what's happening and reporting it.

Now we see the physical presence of newspapers -- long primal, central, local institutions -- reduced or moved away.

The latest case is in Santa Cruz, which had had a locally owned paper until 1982. The Sentinel then was sold and became an Ottaway paper. You'll recall how eloquent Jim Ottaway has been throughout the News Corp bid process, extolling the need for local journalism.
The Ottaways long ran a prosperous and community-oriented group of dailies across the country. Last year, beginning to reel from the print ad downturn, Dow Jones (which had bought the Ottaway chain in 1970) put a group of them on the market. A half dozen, including the Sentinel, was sold to CNHI, a newer company that's been on a bargain hunt for smaller town newspaper properties. In October of last year, CNHI got the Sentinel. In February, it re-sold the Sentinel to Dean Singleton's Media News.

(Now with News Corp's acquisition of Dow Jones, look for the remaining Ottaway papers to be shopped quickly as well.)

The Sentinel joined what had quickly become the largest newspaper group in the prosperous and well-educated Bay Area. It joined the Alameda Newspaper Group, which Singleton had assembled from a number of properties over the years, and the Contra Costa Times and the San Jose Mercury News, both papers bought from McClatchy in 2006.

Singleton's approach is the dominant one in the industry -- clustering. It's a simple concept. Buy up as many papers in one area as you can, ones close enough together so that you can combine as many operations as possible, from news-gathering and ad-selling to production and distribution.

It makes good economic sense and might be a way to preserve the core of newspapers' central importance in their communities -- if it's not carried too far.

It's been carried too far, already, in Santa Cruz, and I'm sure in many communities around the nation. And we're closer to the beginning of the cuts than the end.

Consider the Santa Cruz experience:

---In March, the paper closed down its local presses, long a viewable fixture on Church Street, and began printing the paper nightly over the hill on the Mercury News presses. Deadlines moved up at least an hour.

---In June, the paper cut its reporting staff by 21%. That's 8 of 38 positions. For vituperative community reaction, you can check out gutting several beats">this reaction.

---Last week, it announced it has sold its building -- the iconic one built in 1856 and which has housed the oldest business in town. It's move from Santa Cruz's vibrant downtown and true regional center to Scotts Valley, a suburb on the edge of the county. The sales price of the real estate was undisclosed, but it had been put on the market at $6 million.

Certainly the newspaper business needs to do its cutting. But it's how the cutting is done -- how much art, how much blood -- that will be the history of this time.

In the meantime, we can be sure that our sight isn't deceiving us. The press is literally vanishing before our eyes.

Comments

[Amy]

Ken,
Poignant, lovely, infuriating all at once...what a good tale to tell to illustrate the disappearance of the local newspaper as a central institution in a community.

And what a contrast that just this a.m. I read an interview with Saks CEO, Stephen Sadove, who said, "Each of our stores is so different that is not about national advertising but about local advertising, marketing, outreach, initiatives, presence in the community and being involved in local events..."

The retailers look to integrate their local presence even more...who would have guessed it would be the newspaper that looks to disengage.