Self-governance, the ability of a community to manage its own affairs, depends on local news. Not international, national, or political news. Not regional or state news, though both can provide context for local decisions. What matters most is news of municipal government, the schools, public safety, and the work of a town’s many departments and volunteer boards. Such coverage is beyond the means of Greater Boston’s regional papers like the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, the Lowell Sun, or Boston Globe. Infinity in a grain of sand.
Study after study has shown there is no substitute for a local outlet that can focus on a particular municipality, whether digital, broadcast, or print. Without it, voter turnout and participation at town meeting declines, leaving a town vulnerable to well-organized special interests. Bond ratings drop, raising the cost of municipal borrowing. Mismanagement goes unchallenged, and threats to safety and health go unreported.
According to the latest annual report of the Medill Institute at Northwestern University, “The State of Local News 2024,” the preceding year, 2023, was not a good one for local news. The country continued to lose papers, mostly weeklies, at the rate of two and a half per week—3,200 since 2005, 130 closures in the past year alone, several in New England.
Medill estimates there are roughly 5,600 newspapers left in the U.S., 80% of which are weeklies, like the Press. An “early warning system” introduced by Medill last year says an additional 279 counties are in danger of becoming news deserts, counties without a daily or weekly paper or any other source of local news.
Medill did find hope in the growing number of entrepreneurial startups, 258 of which are less than 5 years old. A majority, however, are confined to affluent communities like our neighbors in Acton, Boxborough, or Concord with the readership and resources to sustain them. But achieving sustainability is an ongoing challenge for us all. Medill found that all but one of the dozen startups that it spotlighted are locally owned and accountable, suggesting, they say, that local news operations “with entrepreneurial owners and community support” have a much better shot at achieving sustainability. But moving from a successful startup, energized by volunteers and contributors willing to work for below-market wages, to a sustainable enterprise is a journey that few have mastered.
The Press is fortunate to have the support of its sustaining subscribers and loyal advertisers. With their continuing help we look forward to delivering the news in 2025 that Harvard needs to self-govern and grow as a community.
