Avoiding the ‘news desert’

A friend sent me an envelope the other day. It was magazine-sized, and my wife immediately suspected trouble. “Is it a Playboy?” she asked. I laughed, but was about 75 percent sure she was correct. 

But what I pulled out of that envelope brought none of the joy Playboy routinely delivers — through its insightful articles, I mean. This was a copy of last week’s Washington Post Magazine. Look, I’m groaning with you. The Washington Post isn’t necessarily my go-to place for national news, but the subject of last week’s magazine was of particular interest to me. And it should be to you as well. 

Essentially, the magazine highlighted stories written from “news deserts” across America — places that have lost their newspapers and no longer have anyone covering their stories. These articles weren’t written by Washington Post reporters, but by journalists from across the fruited plain and the stories are a hodgepodge of subjects important to their communities. There’s a story about erosion threatening a school in Alaska; grizzly bear murders in Idaho; two Oregon men who bury unclaimed human remains; and dust problems in Utah, to name a few. 

Maybe few of those would pique your interest much here in LA, but by the same token, I’m sure much of what’s happening here wouldn’t flip anyone’s lid in the middle of Montana. But the thing to keep in mind is that there’s no publication in these communities in which to run locally vital stories. Thus the term “news desert.” 

Essentially, a news desert is a community, either rural or urban, that no longer has access to credible news and information. With 2,200 print newspapers failing across the country in the past 16 years, there are a lot of communities that no longer have anyone covering them. The place where I started my journalism career — Pascagoula, Mississippi — just about 40 minutes away is an example. Local leaders there had me over a few years ago to talk about how they could start a newspaper because they have no one covering their city council, police, sheriff, county government or really much of anything. They were extremely frustrated.

I would consider Pascagoula a news desert now. When I worked at The Mississippi Press just before the internet became a thing, it was a 25,000-circulation daily newspaper. Even though it was a Newhouse paper and kind of an ugly step-sister to the mighty Mobile Press-Register back when it was pumping out 120,000 papers on Sunday, The Mississippi Press wasn’t immune to changing times. It dwindled badly before Hurricane Katrina more or less did it in. It really hasn’t existed as a separate entity in years. 

And really, think about our own Press-Register. When we started Lagniappe 20 years ago, it was still blowing and going and was a major force in Alabama. In fact, we never imagined a scenario in which there wouldn’t be a daily newspaper in Mobile. Lagniappe was started as an “alternative” newspaper, essentially meaning we’d try to cover the things the big guys were leaving behind. But what they left behind was just about everything. 

We all know the story of Newhouse taking all of its newspapers nationwide to three days a week and focusing on a digital-first strategy. It killed or maimed many newspapers across the country and put hundreds, if not thousands, of journalists out of work. The acclaimed New Orleans Times-Picayune, for example, is no longer. 

Mobile’s Press-Register exists as a bureau of The Birmingham News now. The publisher is in B-ham, as are the editors and just about every other thing that makes up an independent newspaper. A few journalists are left here to cover an area once covered by dozens of reporters. Every time I’ve picked up a “Press-Register” in the past couple of years, it’s mostly Birmingham news with some local stuff sprinkled in. 

I’m not writing this to put down anyone at Alabama Media Group or al.com or the Press-Register. I’m just trying to point out how much news coverage of our own area has changed in the past seven or eight years. 

Lagniappe went weekly in 2014 in hopes of trying to fill some of the gap left by what was happening at the P-R. I’d love to say we cover everything with our staff of four full-time journalists, but that’s not true. We have to pick and choose and hope to hit the important stuff. I think we do a good job of that, but it’s hardly ideal. Those who live in smaller areas in our readership may only experience coverage when mini horses or slapping employees are involved. That’s far from ideal. 

We’ve bucked the trends for nearly two decades now, surviving multiple recessions, hatred spawned by the term “fake news,” Facebook and Google, and COVID so far. And we’re lucky to have such dedicated advertisers and subscribers who have made it financially possible to leap each of those hurdles. 

I’m proud to say Lagniappe has done lots of work over the past few years no one else in Alabama has had the guts to touch. There are many things we’ve written about that have only been covered in our highly absorbent pages or on our easy-to-navigate website. 

The newspaper world has changed a lot since I first interned at the Press-Register in 1987. Back then, people expected to pay for news each day. Then the internet came along and someone convinced the newspaper gods that “clicks” were more important than placing value on their news product, so newspapers taught everyone news was now free online. But that didn’t quite work out. 

So now the only working model is once again subscriptions. For some, this has been amazing. The big, national newspapers have six or seven times more subscribers now than they ever had before the web came along. But smaller newspapers continue to struggle to get folks to part with a pittance for their news. It’s doubly hard for us because we don’t charge for the print version of the paper and most readers don’t want to pay a little bit more to get online-only content and breaking news access. 

I’m sure all of y’all are sick of hearing us tell you a subscription to lagniappemobile.com is only 21 cents a day, or less than a cup of coffee a week ($1.50), but it’s important. I can tell you subscriptions are what allowed us to make it through COVID. They are what allowed us to add a new reporter a few months ago. They’ve put this newspaper in your hand.

We don’t intend to go away, but I’m sure the billionaires at Newhouse thought the same. Each new year brings new challenges. Right now we’re offering the best subscription deal of the year. I hope you’ll get on board and help us continue exposing corruption in our area and across the state. We would love to put a Lagniappe reporter in Montgomery to stir things up, but that’s up to you, dear reader. 

Trust me, you don’t ever want Mobile to become a news desert. A couple of dimes a day will make sure that doesn’t happen.