N c , The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com Briggs-Bunting, director of Michi- NEWSPAPER gan State University's School of From Page 1A Journalism. She said because The Ann place in their area. Arbor News is morphing into a twice-weekly print publica- ANN ARBOR'S MEDIA tion with a heavy online empha- FUTURE sis - in addition to Ann Arbor's affluent, Web-savvy makeup There was an outcry when Lau- - residents will be fine reading rel Champion, the publisher of The their news online. Ann Arbor News, announced the "The biggest concern when a paper would shut down after its city loses its paper is Web access," 174 years of existence. Briggs-Bunting said. "In a place But despite the disappointment like Ann Arbor, that's not as much many have expressed because of of a concern." the impending closure, the general Aside from AnnArbor.com and consensus among analysts seems its print counterpart, The Michi- to be that the city of Ann Arbor gan Daily will continue to pub- - more so than most - is ready lish on weekdays from September to embrace the next generation of through April and maintain its news. online presence. The Ann Arbor "People have been very under- Chronicle, a year-old, Web-only, snending," said Champion, adding blog-like source on city affairs, that she had Peturned calls from also contributes original reporting around 100 town residents and to the city. members of the media regarding In short, experts say the media the paper's future. "There's defi- landscape in Ann Arbor appears nitely a sense of mourning for The to be changing, but not dying out Ann Arbor News. But then as you completely. get to the end of your conversation "Most newspapers are making with the residents, they say, 'You money from their websites," said know, this AnnArbor.com thing American University Journalism sounds pretty cool."' Prof. Amy Eisman, who has done AnnArbor.com is the website consulting for several major news- that the paper's management papers trying to make the shift announced will largely replace the from print to the Web. "It's just print version starting this sum- that those papers aren't making mer. enough to sustain an entire print For now, Ann Arbor is on track organization and newsroom." to become the largest city in the country to lose its primary daily HOW SMALL TOWNS SUFFER newspaper this year. For most cities comparable in The very thing that Briggs- size to Ann Arbor - which has Bunting said will keep Ann Arbor about 100,000 residents - there residents informed - Web access would normally be more concern - is what could prevent smaller about the loss of the daily newspa- communities from gathering the per. One would think, with a major information they're used to hav- metropolis just a half hour away, ing. other news organizations would be People in places like Ann Arbor, rushingto Ann Arbor to fill the gap where about 70 percent ofresidents that will be left behind by The Ann over the age of 25 hold a bachelor's Arbor News. degreeorhigher, arewellequipped But with both the Detroit Free to read online-only coverage. The Press and The Detroit News facing community's affluence is among their own financial turmoil, that the key reasons AnnArbor.com isn't very likely, said Don Nauss, will soon replace The Ann Arbor managing editor of The Detroit News, Champion said. News. But in many cases, the nation's "Traditionally in this situation, recession has forced newspapers I think, we would have made a play to cut back print publications in for Ann Arbor by adding reporters markets that aren't prepared to and doing more advertising there," make the shift to online yet. said Nauss, adding that he and A town like Newton, Miss., other executives at his paper were which in January lost its caught off guard by The Ann Arbor 107-year-old daily, The Newton News's closing. "About 10 years ago Record, is one such example. The or so, we had more resources and town of 4,000, which is about an were still looking to expand. But hour east of the state's capitol I just don't know that we have the in Jackson, is Ann Arbor's polar resources to do it right now." opposite. In Newton, just over 12 Editors at the Detroit Free Press percent of residents hold a bach- did not return phone calls request- elor's degree and nearly a fifth of ing comment for this story. its residents are living below the Even without the major metro poverty line. newspapers making a concerted "The closing of the newspaper push into Washtenaw County, here was very abrupt and didn't Ann Arborites who want to stay give the residents a chance to informed on city issues should be brace for it," said Newton Mayor able to for the most part, said Jane Michael Pickens, who said the the michigan daily paper was a casualty of slump- task of watchdogjournalism would ing advertising sales and the be affected in any way because of town's poor economy. "Once the the smaller staff, Champion said, newspaper closed, we scrambled "Absolutely not. We're going to be for about two weeks to see if we providing the information in a dif- could fill that hole." ferent way, but we're not giving up The paper won't be restored, but on the traditional local watchdog Pickens said his town was fortu- journalism role." nate because another paper in the Others were skeptical about county was in good enough finan- Champion's assertion. cial shape to hire a pair of report- "If they (AnnArbor.com) are ers from The Newton Record. only rehiring a fraction of their Those reporters have been tasked staff, there's no way the staff with covering Newton in hopes of can accomplish all the same filling that void. things they did before," said Uni- Newton is just one of many versity of San Francisco Prof. towns across America to see its Teresa Moore, who teaches in lone paper vanish. According to the media studies department Paper Cuts, a blog that tracks the and spent 10 years reporting for print newspaper industry's woes, the now-endangered San Fran- 87 American newspapers have cisco Chronicle. "There's no way closed or gone online-only since for the skeleton staff to do the New Year's Day. Most of those things the community has come papers served rural communities to expect from them." with limited populations. Moore said AnnArbor.com Boston University's Mitchell could play a strong watchdog role Zuckoff, a journalism professor, in the community, but only if it said it would be a mistake for most chooses to focus solely on thattype newspapers to do what The Ann of reporting. Arbor News and Seattle Post-Intel- ProPublica, a New York City- ligencer have done. based, online-only outlet, hastaken "There's a huge risk involved that very approach. The two-year- in jumping to online-only. It can old site, which employs 28 investi- definitely be done too soon," said gative reporters, offers its stories Zuckoff, who was nominated to major media outlets in hopes of for a Pulitzer Prize in investiga- garnering recognition and, in turn, tive reporting during his time at advertising revenue. The Boston Globe. "You risk los- ProPublica managing editor ing your legacy readers, who have Stephen Engelberg; an Ann Arbor traditionally gonse out to the end native and former investigative of the driveway or the mailbox reporter at The New York Times, to get a print copy. It's premature said he believes more groups will to think that every community is adopt his outlet's model, which is ready to automatically migrate to funded by The Sandler Foundation the Web." and donations from online read- Zuckoff's point is especially true ers. in Pinckneyville, Ill., a town of "The way we're dojng it - 5,500 that lost its paper, The Dem- through pure philanthropy - is not ocraf, in March. After the paper going to be possible everywhere, folded, residents there couldn't go but I expect that we will see more online - the 140-year-old paper independent, Web-based, investi- didn't have a website. gative reporting," he said. "This sort of thing leaves a huge Pinckneyville, Ill., illustrates hole in a small community like Engelberg's point that in some ours," said Pinckneyville Mayor places, democracy is already in Joseph Holder, who has lived in danger. The town has no reason the town all 60 years of his life. to expect that another paper will "We have no idea how to fill that sprout up anytime soon. And as for void right now. It's going to take thelocalnewswebsite,well,there's awhile." a better chance that another news- paper may come along before that DEMOCRACY AT RISK? happens. Holder, the town's mayor, said Industry experts were unani- papers from other towns parachute mous in one sense: each said news- in every now and again by send- paper closings anywhere, paired ing a reporter to a city council or with the loss of reporters, are a school board meeting, but that the threat to democracy. coverage ends up being "sketchy at For that reason, people will take best" and "not adequate at all." great interest in what happens Asked whether he, as a politi- with AnnArbor.com's . coverage cian, was happy that no media later this summer. Can the site, outlet could closely scrutinize his with only a fraction of the paper's work, Holder laughed. current staff, be anywhere near "I guess when you're mayor of a as hard-hitting as The Ann Arbor smallplace like this, you don't have News? much to hide," he said. "I'd rather Champion, who will act as have a reporter grill me with hard executive vice president of AnnAr- questions to let my town know bor.com, believes the website can what's going on than have my peo- accomplish just as much as the ple in the dark wondering what's print product. When asked if the going on." BUDGET From Page 1A Last week at Coleman's monthly fireside chat - an event to which a group of students are invited to meet with the president and to ask questions and share concerns about the University - Royster Harper, vice president for student affairs, told students about her experience with the budget conference this year. "We went into our budget meet- ing, and we had squirreled away a little money, and so the issue on the table when we got there was 'What are you going to do with all this money?' she said. "We had squir- reled it away for specific things that we knew we were going to have to replace or some equipment, so we had our little list." Harper said because the bud- get she had presented looked too large, she was forced to go back and outline more specifically what the money would be used for, so the provost could review the budget more carefully. "When she saw the budget, it was big at the bottom," she said. "So we had to go back, make our list and show her exactly why we 'didn't have what looked like a lot of money." Sullivan said after budget con- ferences are finished, she joins her budget team in reviewing the list of priorities from each school or office to determine what may be feasible for the following year. At the same time, Sullivan said her budget team will review ways to control expens- es through cost containment. "If we can contain costs, that makes a big difference in the bud- get," she said, adding that the Uni- versity has eliminated $135 million in expenses over the past six years because of cost containment. The approximately $135 mil- lion in savings has been due to measures like changing how the University orders and distributes supplies, increasing energy effi- ciency at several campus build- ings and alternative strategies for managing employee health care benefits. Sullivan stressed that in order to protect the University financially from year to year, cost containment measures have to be permanent solutions. For example, the Univer- sity has renegotiated several con- tracts with suppliers to gain more favorable prices and switched to a direct-delivery system -eliminat- ing the need for a central office on campus to deliver office supplies to various schools and offices. Sullivan said one-time cuts can create a structural deficit - mean- ing the expenses may return the following year requiring the Uni- versity to make deeper cuts or raise revenue streams, like tuition, more dramatically to cover the costs. The University has had an equal- ly long-term approach to other aspects of its financial planning. Approximately two years ago the University switched from a five year rolling average on payouts from its endowment to a seen-year aver- age to better insulate the Univer- sity's endowment from changing winds in the nation's economy. This means the 5 percent annual payout from the endowment is based on the past seven years' performance, which mitigates temporary spikes or dips in stock markets and other investments. Coleman and Sullivan both said the same conservative approach would be taken with any money the University might receive from the federal stimulus package. Instead of using the money to cover exist- ing operating costs, both said the money would be used for one-time expenses, since the money would not be available in the future. Sullivan said throughoutthe pro- cess she also receives advice from multiple advisory groups that are convened to offer advice about the budget. Two such advisory boards include the Student Budget Advi- sory Committee, which consists of students from campus that meet with Sullivan on a monthly basis, and the Prudence Panel, which has members from the faculty, staff and Monday, April 20, 2009 - 7A students on campus: In a meeting with Sullivan and some members of the Student Bud- get Advisory Committee last week, committee members explained the committee has met approximately six times since it was founded last fall. The committee, Sullivan said, was created to bring a student voice into the budget process and help students learn about the Univer- sity's budget process. The Prudence Panel, which was also formed earlier this year, is a committee of faculty, staff and stu- dentsthatmeetswiththeprovostto discuss ways to cut expenses from the general fund. Sullivan said although the com- mitteesmaynotmakerecommenda- tions on cost-cutting strategies that can be immediately implemented, their recommendationsmay be able to help cut costs in future years. After all the recommendations and budget proposals have been received and discussed by the pro- vost's budget committee, the pro- vost and her staffwill work to create a budget that will balance expenses with expected rvenues. Revenue streams to the Univer- sity include appropriations from the state, tuition paid by students, endowment revenue, research grants, and other fees charged for services. Some sources of revenue can be restricted for certain activities. gor instance, most endowment funds are given by donors for a specific purpose and can only be used for that purpose, whether it be student scholarships, endowed professor- ships or special programs at the University. Other funding from the Health System and the Athletic Depart- ment is used by those entities and does not enter the general fund - excluding funds from the Athletic Department that pay for student- athlete scholarships and money contributed for general financial aid. On the other hand, state appro- priations can be used for any pur- pose at the University. Coleman said the fact that state appropria- tion money isn't earmarked for any- thing makes it especially valuable to the University because it can be used for any purpose. Since 2002, the University has lost $36 million of state appropria- tions in nominal dollars and more than $100 million in total of state appropriations in real dollars - which are adjusted for inflation at the Consumer Price Index for Detroit. Sullivan said it can be very dif- ficult to predict revenue levels because the University finalizes its budget in June, butthe state doesn't finalize its budget until the end of September - making it hard to pre- dict state appropriation levels. "We go to our board in June, but thestatebudgetdoesn'tgetwrapped up until Sept. 30 so we have to make a guess everyyear about how much we're goingto get," she said. Last year was the first time the budget was presented to the Uni- versity Board of Regents in June. Previously the budget was not pre- sented until July. Sullivan said she instituted the change so incoming freshmen know their tuition rates earlier in the summer. Sullivan said in the past, esti- mates have not always been accu- rate, but that she tries to estimate conservatively to ensure drastic measures like a mid-year tuition increase aren't necessary. For example, Sullivan said last year the University's estimates were wrong last year, but that the decision was made to absorb the difference internally as opposed to further raisingtuition. "I have to be the most conser- vative person about the budget on campus," Sullivan said, "because if I get it wrong, we all pay the price for 12 months, maybe more." The regents have unanimously approved the University's budgets - including those for each of the University's three campuses and the healthsystem- for the pasttwo years. However, in 2006, Regent Andrea Fisher Newman (R-Ann Arbor) opposed each of the budget proposals. FREE SUBLET FINDER. studio-3 bedrooms; 19 locations to choose from. (734) 741-9300 www.annarborapartments.net MAY - AUG Sublet. 726 S. State. 2 bdrm 2-3 ppl. heat/H20/direct tv incl. fully furn. $350/person or best offer. 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This year something you've been involved with foe the past nine years will diminish or end it order to make room for something Bitodaterof: James McAvoy, actor; Patti LuPone, actress/singer; Queen Elizabeth II, British royal. know the total cost of the dam- CRIME age, but that the glass in the front From Page 1A door alone costs about $1,000 to replace. shattered the door he ran away and Police apprehended the man out- entered a nearby house, at which side the nearby house, and he now point Carmody yelled for someone potentially faces charges for mali- to call the police. cious destruction of property and Carmody said he does not yet minor in possession of alcohol. HANDY WITH A CAMERA? JOIN DAILY MULTIMEDIA. E-mail davazad@umidh.edu 0 2009K ing Features Syndicate, Inc.