E&P Reports with Mike Blinder

Imagine running a newspaper where you're the editor, reporter, photographer, designer and sometimes the person challenging city hall. For many rural publishers, that's not an exaggeration. It's their daily reality. Yet amid growing concerns about news deserts and disappearing newspapers, some small-town publishers are finding ways to survive by rethinking their business models and strengthening community relationships. During this episode of E&P Reports, Bill McKenzie of the George W. Bush Institute and Texas publisher Suzanne Bellsnyder discussed what it really takes to keep rural journalism alive.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/rural-journalism-isnt-dead-but-the-old-business-model-may-be,263907

When much of the news media industry is talking about contraction, Detroit PBS is doing something decidedly different: building. The public media organization has broken ground on a new 50,000-square-foot campus designed not simply as a television facility, but as a home for journalism, radio, education, culture, community engagement and multiplatform storytelling. During a recent episode of E&P Reports, Detroit PBS President and CEO Rich Homberg explained why the project represents the culmination of a 15-year effort to rethink what a local media organization can become.

Explore more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/detroit-breaks-ground-on-a-40-million-bet-on-the-future-of-local-media,263826

Every week seems to bring another announcement of a newspaper closing, a newsroom shrinking or another community joining the growing list of America's news deserts. Against that backdrop, launching a new local news organization might seem like a risky proposition. Expanding into print less than a year later might sound almost unimaginable. Yet that's exactly what Alabama Newswire has done. During this episode of E&P Reports, founder Scott Centers and publisher Jackson Kimbrell shared why they believe local journalism still represents an opportunity for entrepreneurs willing to meet communities where they are.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/building-local-news-instead-of-mourning-it-inside-alabama-newswires-growth-strategy,263728

For the third consecutive year, Northwestern University's Medill School has tracked how Americans' local news habits are changing. The latest survey confirms that audience demand for local journalism remains remarkably resilient, but it also reveals widening cracks in the industry's business model, growing skepticism about AI and an accelerating shift away from traditional broadcast platforms. During this episode of E&P Reports, researchers Tim Franklin and Dr. Stephanie Edgerly explained what every news leader should take away from the findings.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/good-news-half-of-americans-consume-local-news-daily-bad-news-only-14-pay-for-it,263613

Twenty-five years after the attacks of September 11, leading journalists, First Amendment advocates and scholars gathered at Columbia University for The Forever War and the First Amendment, a symposium examining how two decades of conflict reshaped journalism. Fresh from the event, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Azmat Khan joined E&P Reports to discuss what the press learned—and failed to learn—from covering the War on Terror. She argued that many of the challenges exposed after 9/11, from overreliance on government sources to growing secrecy and declining public trust, continue to shape journalism today. For local news leaders, Khan said, those lessons remain as relevant in their communities as they are on the world's biggest stories.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at:

https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/journalism-after-911-azmat-khan-on-the-lessons-reporters-still-cant-afford-to-ignore,263498

News industry leaders weigh whether pressure to repeal Canada's Online News Act could threaten newsroom funding and weaken publishers' push for platform compensation worldwide.

Could a deal to ease the U.S.-Canada trade war let Big Tech off the hook for funding news? Canada's Online News Act has secured millions for journalism, but publishers fear that support could become a bargaining chip in negotiations with Washington. For newsrooms receiving the money, the stakes are immediate; for publishers elsewhere, the outcome could shape their own fight for compensation. Four industry and policy leaders joined E&P Reports: Paul Deegan, president and CEO of News Media Canada, Neil Quinter, senior vice president of the News/Media Alliance, Hugh Stephens, a distinguished fellow with the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada and executive fellow at the University of Calgary and Stig Ørskov, CEO of WAN-IFRA to examine the threat, challenge the trade arguments and explain why this Canadian battle matters far beyond its borders.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at:

https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/news-funding-as-a-bargaining-chip-could-the-us-canada-trade-war-let-big-tech-off-the-hook,263408

Local news remains under enormous financial pressure, but the market for community publications is far from dead. A varied group of independent publishers, entrepreneurs and nonprofit organizations is stepping forward to invest in titles that still matter to their communities. Sara April, president of Dirks, Van Essen & April, says many of these buyers are motivated by more than profit. Their commitment to preserving local journalism gives her renewed optimism about its future.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at:

https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/when-wildfires-hit-home-inside-the-spokesman-reviews-race-to-inform-spokane,263187

When wildfires roared toward Spokane, the journalists covering the disaster suddenly found their own homes, neighbors and newsroom in its path. Three newsroom leaders reveal how The Spokesman-Review raced toward the danger to deliver lifesaving information, verify rapidly changing facts and document the devastation consuming its community. Their experience offers a powerful lesson in what local journalism demands when the story hits home.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at:

https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/when-wildfires-hit-home-inside-the-spokesman-reviews-race-to-inform-spokane,263187

Alternative weeklies were once the unruly heartbeat of American cities, shaping politics, culture, nightlife and public conversation before collapsing advertising and changing media habits pushed many toward extinction. Brady Walkinshaw believes the industry mistook disruption for irrelevance. Through Noisy Creek, he is acquiring, reviving and reinvesting in beloved local publications that others had written off. His wager is that their fiercely independent voices, community roots and tangible print presence may be more valuable in an increasingly automated media world than ever before.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at:

https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/how-noisy-creek-is-breathing-new-life-into-an-industry-many-had-written-off-a-one-on-one-with,263054

She expected to find an industry weighed down by layoffs, closures and uncertainty. Instead, a summer spent visiting independent newsrooms across America introduced Jasmine Shiffer to publishers, editors and reporters who remain deeply committed to serving their communities—and surprisingly optimistic about the future. Along the way, she discovered that local journalism's greatest strength isn't its technology or business model. It's the people who still believe the work matters.

Access more at this episode's landing page, at:

https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/at-24-she-drove-across-america-looking-for-the-future-of-local-news-what-she-found-surprised-her,262971