Wednesday, January 11th, 2017 / The Statement
4B
Wednesday, January 11th, 201 / The Statement
5B
City Reckons with the
Decline of Newspapers
W
ashtenaw County Commissioner
Conan Smith resigned his elected
post in August of 2016, after
accusations that he engaged in a self-serving
conflict of interest surfaced.
In a letter to the County Board, Mary Morgan,
former opinion editor of the now-defunct Ann
Arbor News, alleged Smith was unethically using
his position as an elected official to secure a position
as Washtenaw County’s director of community
and economic development. The position likely
would have carried a 6-figure salary.
“The board of commissioners is not responsible
for hiring county employees, other than the county
administrator,” Morgan wrote. “So there’s no
reason for commissioners to be involved in the
hiring process for other county staff, much less a
single commissioner acting alone.”
Although acknowledging he had been pursuing
the position, Smith denied any wrongdoing in an
interview with the Daily.
In October, Smith announced his intention
to run for re-election to the county commission
seat he had resigned from just two months
earlier, taking himself out of consideration for the
economic development position.
Faced with only write-in opposition — several
protest candidates and his board-appointed
interim successor — some of Smith’s former
constituents said few voters seemed to be aware
of his conduct, which they attributed to lax local
media coverage of the issue.
“It’s kind of sad how many people don’t know
about this situation,” Ann Arbor resident Judy
Foy said in an October interview. “He’ll just be the
name on the ballot.”
When Ann Arborites turned out en masse
for Hillary Clinton on November 8th — Clinton
carried 68 percent of the county — Smith’s write-
in opponents secured only 9 percent of the vote.
Ninety-one percent of voters on Ann Arbor’s west
side were either unaware of Smith’s resignation
and waffling, or they were content to overlook it.
Some of Smith’s critics would blame a variety of
factors, from straight-ticket voting to civic apathy.
“He had the luxury of turning his back on the
people he’s supposed to represent for a couple
months... knowing that he’ll get re-elected in
November because of straight-ticket voting,” local
resident Jeff Hayner told the Daily in October.
Others — such as Morgan — attributed the
scandal and Smith’s reelection to a more systemic
problem: The deterioration of local news coverage’s
ability to ensure government transparency,
beginning with the Ann Arbor News’ 2009 closure
amid flagging revenue.
“If I had not reported on (Conan Smith), it
wouldn’t have been daylighted,” Morgan said.
“In terms of things that are happening in our
government that aren’t getting covered, that is a
good example.”
On the Monday morning of March 23, 2009,
Ed Petykiewicz, then-Ann Arbor News editor in
chief, was seen walking out of his office visibly
distraught, according to former News copy editor
Domenica Trevor.
“(Petykiewicz) looked like somebody had
whacked him in the face with a two-by-four, he
looked shocked,” Trevor said.
Several minutes later, a staff meeting — with
almost 100 attendees despite recent waves of
buyouts — was called with little explanation.
Many thought a new wave of cuts was about to be
announced.
Instead of announcing more staff cuts, Ann
Arbor News publisher Laurel Champion, with a
pained expression, informed them the newspaper,
with 174 years of history and 45,000 daily
subscribers, would cease production that July.
The staff was stunned, and most would be out of
work in four months.
In a letter to the public later that day, Champion
wrote the decision by its owners — New Jersey-
based Advance Publications — to close the paper
was due to declining print advertising revenue.
Champion also announced the shift of the
publication’s remaining resources to a soon-to-be-
launched platform, AnnArbor.com.
“We have shared with you before in our pages
the extreme challenges that our industry and
our newspaper have faced over the last couple
years,” Champion wrote. “Out of those challenges
has come a new opportunity. Our new strategy
reflects shifting media consumption habits and
advertising revenue in the newspaper business,
and particularly in Michigan.”
Though few, if any, Ann Arbor News staff
expected an outright closure prior to the
announcement, warning signs of the paper’s
troubles had been present for years.
The size of the print edition was reduced in
2007 to cut newsprint costs, according to several
former staff members. In 2008, Advanced
Publications announced the News’ copy desk and
several of its other production functions would
be downsized and centralized to a Grand
Rapids office. The size of the staff — including
newsroom, distribution and business — was
whittled through attrition and concurrent
waves of buyouts, from 400 to 272 by 2009.
Some left of their own accord in the period
immediately before the closure. Morgan left
as opinion editor in 2008, after 12 years at the
News.
“At the time, you could see they were not
investing in the newsroom and that when
people left, they weren’t being replaced,”
Morgan said. “Generally, it did not seem like
there was a vision from the leadership.”
Trevor, seeing poor future prospects for her
role as a copy editor at the News, accepted a
buyout offer in late 2008, though she continued
working through July 2009. She now works as
a paralegal and freelance copy editor in Ann
Arbor.
“A bunch of people were offered buyouts,”
Trevor said. “Any copy editor with any sense
took it because there was an ‘opportunity’ for
employment in Grand Rapids, but we were
being told it’s just not going to happen.”
The Ann Arbor News staff was promised an
opportunity to apply for positions at the new
publication, AnnArbor.com and about a dozen
employees were retained, according to several
former staff members. The rest moved to other
publications, freelance positions or entirely
new careers.
The market trends ending The Ann Arbor
News were hardly confined to Ann Arbor. Until
the advent of the Internet, most medium-sized
cities could support at least one independent
daily print publication that could reap healthy
profit margins by holding a de-facto monopoly
on local classified ad sales.
Although the Internet would begin eroding
newspapers’ competitive advantage as a one-
stop shop for local advertisers in the 1990s
and early 2000s, newspapers were largely able
to weather the changing market. Total U.S.
newspaper ad revenue would peak in 2005 at
$49.4 billion — even when daily subscriptions
had been in decline for years — according to
Pew Research.
Freefall ensued during the 2007 financial
crisis and the subsequent recession. Newspaper
ad sales plummeted 60 percent below their pre-
recession peak to $19.9 billion by 2014 (the last
year the Newspaper Association of America
published figures), as advertisers realized they
could target audiences more effectively online
and slashed their print spending.
The employment prospects of newsroom
staff have followed their employers’ tanking
earnings. The number of U.S. newspaper
employees plunged by 40 percent from a pre-
recession peak of 55,000 to 32,900 in 2014.
In the decade between 2004 and 2014 at
least 126 daily papers closed, according to
industry publication Editor and Publisher,
and the approximate 1,300 that remained
increasingly had to make do with less. The
same year The Ann Arbor News ceased
production, The Seattle Post-Intelligencer
moved solely online, and both The Detroit
News and The Detroit Free Press cut their
print schedules to three times per week. With
its stock price slipping below $5, the New York
Times Co. was only dissuaded from shutting
The Boston Globe — one of its properties —
when the Globe’s employees agreed to $20
million in concessions.
AnnArbor.com — which fully merged into
the Mlive brand in 2013 — is a leaner operation
than its predecessor. The print schedule was
cut to twice a week and its copy desk, sales,
production, circulation and sports coverage
were consolidated into its parent company’s
statewide operation alongside seven other
local papers.
Individual reporters are saddled with greater
responsibilities than their forerunners: They
cover multiple beats, take their own photos
and run their own social media, according to
Jenn McKee, a former entertainment reporter
at the Ann Arbor News and MLive .
“Really focusing on your writing and
having that be your calling card isn’t enough;
you really need to be a more well-rounded
journalist and be able to offer all those things,”
Mckee said. “That’s a pretty sharp shift for
people who have been doing this for a while to
make.”
John Hiner, vice president of content at
MLive, said the economic realities of the news
industry make the scale of old local newspapers
financially unrealistic, and traditional media
companies must increasingly explore alternate
sources of revenue.
“We don’t dream about putting everything
back the way it was,” Hiner said. “But I think
you can find continued growth in digital
revenue.”
Hiner further said MLive has prioritized
preserving its reporting capacity, explaining
that while about 25 staff members work in the
Ann Arbor office — less than 10 percent of the
272 who were in 2009 — most cuts have been to
non-editorial positions, like those consolidated
under
MLive’s
statewide
functions.
He
estimated this means the reporting staff is
The Twilight of
Newspapers in Ann
Arbor:
b y B r i a n K u a n g, D a i l y S t a f f R e p o r t e r
between
one-third
and
half
of its pre-
2009 headcount.
He also admitted not as much coverage is
possible with fewer staff members, but argued
that the web-based platform of MLive makes
news more immediate to its audience.
“The Ann Arbor News used to be at every
school board meeting, every city zoning
meeting, every library meeting,” Hiner said.
“We still go to those things when they’re
newsworthy and important to the community,
but we don’t babysit boards and council to
the degree we used to when we had more
resources.”
Jen
Eyer,
who
held
various
editorial
leadership roles at MLive’s Ann Arbor office
until 2016 and is now communications director
for gubernatorial candidate Gretchen Whitmer
(D), described maintaining Ann Arbor coverage
as a “constant struggle,” but expressed
admiration for the dedication of the remaining
staff in the face of challenges.
“It pains me to hear the criticism they
sometimes get,” Eyer said. “That newsroom
and the whole organization is still filled with
journalists who believe in the mission of
journalism.”
While acknowledging the efforts of MLive’s
staff, many local residents say the consequences
of large staff cuts and the reduction of printing
to twice a week are difficult to ignore.
Vivienne
Armentrout,
former
county
commissioner
and
long-time
Ann
Arbor
resident who actively blogs about city issues,
said the loss of daily print distribution has
steeply affected public awareness of local news.
“I was here when we actually had an
afternoon paper … we could be sure that
virtually every resident of Ann Arbor was
reading the same news as you were reading,”
Armentrout said. “There was sort of a common
community memory, and now a lot of people are
pretty ignorant of what’s going on.”
These sentiments were echoed by City
Councilmember Jack Eaton (D–Ward 4).
“I have to tell you that (MLive reporter) Ryan
Stanton covers City Council very well,” Eaton said.
“But the public doesn’t necessarily read everything
he writes because it’s only published twice a week
and not very many people bother to subscribe to it.”
Both Eaton and Armentrout added that they
see less long-form investigative reporting, and it is
evident the smaller staff is spread thinner than its
predecessors.
“A local person who’s involved, such as myself,
kind of has to piece together the news,” Eaton said.
“You need to listen to WEMU, because they do
fairly good local coverage, you need to hunt down a
copy of The Ann magazine.”
A year after the News’ closing, The Ann
magazine, a monthly glossy magazine featuring
long-form pieces on local news, was launched.
Jim McBee, creative director of The Ann, has
worked at a variety of local papers in California,
the Carolinas and Wyoming. However, he found
himself increasingly disillusioned as long-term
prospects soured.
“While I was still in newspapers, I just felt
like I was just riding it out,” McBee said.
As The Ann Arbor News was closing shop,
McBee’s former co-worker Kyle Poplin was in
Ann Arbor on a Knight-Wallace Fellowship, an
award for mid-career journalists to study at
the University of Michigan for a year. Poplin
saw an editorial void left by the News’ closure
— a lack of in-depth longform reporting — and
reached out to McBee, ultimately conceiving
the magazine.
“Our desire editorially is to do the big
projects newspapers used to do,” McBee said.
“That’s the idea, to do the big in-depth story …
that newspapers have a really hard time doing
now because they’ve fired all their experienced
reporters.”
In the past year, The Ann has featured
stories on topics such as the local startup scene,
emotionally heavy profiles of homelessness in
Washtenaw County and a piece from Morgan
outlining
the
circumstances
surrounding
Conan Smith’s resignation. A large portion of
content comes from freelance writers, while a
core team of four manages editing, production
and advertising sales.
Each month, 18,000 copies are printed and
distributed through direct subscriptions and
a distribution partnership with The New York
Times and The Wall Street Journal, which
include The Ann as an insert in local deliveries
to respective papers.
McBee readily admits, however, that no
monthly publication can fully substitute the
day-to-day
and
breaking
news
reporting
capacity of a daily newspaper. By relying
heavily on freelancers, the Ann cannot readily
do follow-up coverage on recurring issues,
particularly local government.
“I don’t know if I would structure beats the
way a newspaper does, but the fact that I don’t
have a staff of reporters … is a little frustrating,”
McBee said. “Somebody needs to be keeping an
eye on government officials, on businesses, on
whatever. I think it’s a glorious golden age for
graft and corruption.”
Some Ann Arborites were not daunted by
the task of holding local government to task,
though. When Morgan departed from The Ann
Arbor News shortly before its demise, she and
her husband, Dave Askins, launched The Ann
Arbor Chronicle, a Web-based publication
focused on local government, in September
2008.
Aiming to increase civic awareness and
participation, the couple sought to fill a
vacuum left in local government coverage
by the departure of the News. Their site
primarily featured detailed chronicles of local
government meetings and decisions, while
also including original analysis of local policy
issues, columns and cartoons from freelancers.
“By covering government the way we did,
we could lower some of the barriers to entry,”
Morgan said. “The idea was: If people want to
know what’s happening so they can get more
involved, we would provide them with that
information.”
Raising revenue through advertising sales to
local businesses and “voluntary” subscription
fees — the Chronicle was a for-profit entity —
Askins said their site drew between 30 and 40
thousand unique users per month. The couple
was adamant, though, that their success be
measured not by their readership but by their
impact on the functioning of civic life.
Though
the
Chronicle’s
revenue
was
sufficient to cover its costs and the couple’s
living expenses, Askins and Morgan found a
fundamental challenge: Covering every public
meeting could consume as much as 80 hours
per week, even with freelancers’ help.
They determined it would not be possible to
scale up the Chronicle’s revenue to hire full-
time staff without compromising key elements
of their publication. In an August 2014 post,
Askins announced the Chronicle would end
publication.
“In past columns I’ve compared this kind
of labor to running a marathon — with one
key difference: There is no finish line,” Askins
wrote. “You can never really finish. But as a
practical matter you will quit running one day.
And if you never decide to stop, then when you
do stop, it will be because you are dead. So
we’re setting an end date as a kind of artificial
finish line.”
That September, a final post was made on the
Chronicle: A heartfelt farewell from Morgan.
The Chronicle’s departure put residents
in the same predicament they felt when the
Ann Arbor News began downsizing — a lack
of investigative city coverage. Many residents,
including Eaton, still remember the Chronicle’s
reporting fondly.
“The Chronicle wasn’t really traditional
journalism, it was exhaustive journalism where
you’d get 15,000 words on one meeting,” Eaton
said. “It was a great resource for activists or
board members like myself … and I don’t expect
a daily newspaper like MLive or anybody else to
do that kind of exhaustive meeting coverage.”
Now, Askins is on his way out of the city he
has covered for so long. This week, he filled
a U-Haul to move to Madison, South Dakota
(pop: 7,258) to start again as a local journalist.
Despite having a population less than one-
tenth of Ann Arbor, Madison has maintained its
daily print paper — the Madison Daily Leader —
which he and Morgan credit to the publication’s
ownership by the same local family for multiple
generations.
Morgan plans to remain in Ann Arbor for
the “medium term,” until she can transition the
leadership of her civic engagement nonprofit
— the CivCity Initiative — which she began
after the Chronicle closed, before joining her
husband in Madison.
While acknowledging he would miss Ann
Arbor — which he has called home for the last
two decades — Askins bristled with optimism
for what new adventures would await him out
west.
“The work of a local journalist, if you do it
well … you make the place you live in better,
because it allows more people to participate
in the life of the community than otherwise
would be able to,” Askins said. “That’s the work
I want to do ... Ann Arbor’s clearly not the only
place you can do it, and it’s not clear to me you
can work as a local journalist in Ann Arbor
anymore.”
In early 2016, the last two Ann Arbor News
staff members to remain through the entire
transition to MLive — McKee and Managing
Producer Cindy Heflin — were laid off. Heflin
is now a copy editor at the Detroit Free Press,
while McKee works as a freelance reporter.
Today, MLive continues to serve the Ann Arbor
news market.
“I harbor no malice against MLive,” McKee
wrote in a text message. “They’re just trying to
make it through this era, as every news outlet
is.”
Photo by Amelia Cacchione