15 Comments

Another interesting column Dave; I hadn’t heard about the New York idea. I agree fully on your cautions while I also worry about the fraying of local journalism. In a perfect world I’d lean toward helping fund investigative journalism, not necessarily adding sports writers or weathermen. We have a couple of tv investigative reporters in the Nashville area and when they are on to a story - often a scandal of some sort - I would wager those are the most watched (and appreciated) pieces on the newscast. And as your suggest, its the Republicans that most want this kind of reporting to disappear (nobody of any stripe in the public eye enjoys hard-nosed reporters). Iowa and Tennessee have much in common politically.

Expand full comment
author

You’re are spot on about similarities between Iowa and Tennessee. Harder to believe about Tennessee because of the much larger metros you have. I follow Tennessee politics because we have good friends in Nashville who are at wits’ end about all the awful laws passed.

Expand full comment

Tell your Nashville friends they are not alone. Every Democrat in Tennessee thinks they are the only Democrat in the state. In several reliably red counties that surround Nashville, somewhere between 35-40% of the people are actually Democrats. We tend to be very silent.

Expand full comment
May 10Liked by Dave Busiek

They already have Fox News, Sinclair, and Lee Enterprises to support the GOP they don’t need anymore. It’s similar to Tass and Pravda in the old Soviet Union.

Expand full comment
May 10Liked by Dave Busiek

I agree, Dave. I would never accept government funding for my small news operation. Nonprofits and individual donors are better models.

Expand full comment

Dave-An inlighting editorial. As a former 23 year veteran of a school board, I know of the costs that the district paid to have the the districts procedingg, announcment, and legal documents in the county newspapers. Yet, it was a 'checks and balances' reporting of which the public education supported by the government kept that the public informed. Ah, the demise of the small town, the newspapers, news weeklies, and journalism. The 6:00 o'clock news is now the only outlet for most to receive a quick soundbite of news. And my own children who are in their 40's haven't watched TV news ever, no newpapers, and only hear snippited on facebook, Snapchat, or blogs. Embarrassing for our society!! Keep sleuthing and writing in this new media of Red vs. Blue, talkshow evangelists, and blowheart radio charlatans.

Expand full comment
author

James - interesting comment. I’ve said about my own kids, who grew up watching the news with us and reading two newspapers, that they would never write a check to a local newspaper and wouldn’t watch TV news at knifepoint! But they’re well-informed.

Expand full comment
May 10Liked by Dave Busiek

Good essay, Dave. I agree with you. I’ve kept my subscription to the Register, and I donate to public radio and public TV. Hopefully those efforts help.

Expand full comment

Government funding of news organizations has shown to be successful in other nations. The British Broadcast Company (BBC) receives two-thirds of its annual budget from a license (tax) viewers pay to watch BBC television programs, listen to radio and the BBC website, podcasts and related services. The fee is $212 (US dollars) per month per household.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) is also government funded (70 percent) and a recent increase in funding prevented employee layoffs.

The Voice of America—the U.S. external broadcast voice—is fully supported financially by our government. And public radio and TV in America is partially supported by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) that receives money from Congress every year—despite frequent criticism about the relationship between government and broadcast media.

I believe that public money for local media can work if there is a “hands off” legal wall between the government and media recipients. But then who should be eligible? I’ll leave that debate to others.

Expand full comment
author

All good points, Steve. I wrote a column last year about how Trump appointed a guy to run VOA, Radio Marti and other outlets who tried to force journalists to toe the party line. But he’s gone now. I shudder to think what might happen in a second Trump administration.

https://open.substack.com/pub/davebusiek/p/report-says-trump-appointee-tried?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Expand full comment

Dave:

I know that this is "off topic" but there has been a development in small market radio about which you should be aware. As a graduate of the University of Missouri-Columbia school of journalism, you, no doubt, had contact with KWIX-KRES in Moberly, Missouri. In small market Missouri radio, KWIX-KRES were well run and covered everything locally. Now, the staff at KWIX-KRES, along with other stations owned by Alpha Media, has been replaced by Artificial Intelligence. Here is a link to a story from Muddy River News:

https://muddyrivernews.com/opinion/silent-friday-night/20240508151604/

When I was at KTTN in Trenton, Missouri, 500 watts at 1600 daytime only, KWIX-KRES were believed to be the place to work. That is because of the local coverage the stations provided. If there was a game, a parade, a fair, or something else within the coverage area, KWIX-KRES personnel would be there. I never worked at KWIX-KRES, but my brother did while he was at MU in the late 1970s.

I hope that this might be fodder for some of your thoughts about the need for local journalism, both by broadcasters and by newspapers. Without local journalism, community, in my opinion, is lost.

GFD

Expand full comment
author

Wow, I was not aware of that. I’ll check it out. Thanks!

Expand full comment

I agree, Dave - government funding of newspapers would be an ethical trap. It has seemed to me for years that what we need is NONPROFIT newspapers - unemcumbered by fealty to advertisers or to governments. Our own nonprofit online Iowa Capital Dispatch is an AWESOME example. And now all 50 states have their own nonprofit newspaper! Learn more at StatesNewsroom.com

You can subscribe to Iowa Capital Dispatch there for free. If it has value to you, you can donate in support.

Expand full comment
author

Lauren, thanks. I am hopeful about non-profit newsrooms. I wrote a column about Iowa Capital Dispatch a few weeks ago:

https://open.substack.com/pub/davebusiek/p/a-non-profit-newsroom-points-one?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Expand full comment

Good one Dave. I would be VERY interested in seeing if any of Lee Enterprises' properties in New York, like Buffalo, take advantage of this. If you read their earnings reports, Lee has been on a campaign to totally convert to digital and away from "legacy media," which is what they call newspapers these days. That's evident when they cut their Iowa papers back to three print days a week a year ago.

Instead of state subsidies to independent news outlets in Iowa, we've seen local governments, particularly cities and school districts, hire public information officers at taxpayer expense. They usually report directly to the superintendent of schools, the mayor or the city manager. Some of this is born out of frustration over staffing cuts at local papers, but these folks also serve as gatekeepers. It's a lot harder to call up a city department head to find out what's going on without a public information officer playing palace guard. Sometimes they are very helpful with breaking news; other times you end up butting heads. I've experienced both.

Dave Neil, former state labor commissioner, was mayor of La Porte City a few years ago when the La Porte City Progress Review closed down after more than 120 years of operation. Dave told me the city tried to replicate some local news in the municipal utility newsletter but couldn't even come close.

I'm again reminded of the line by Jimmy Stewart as Rance Stoddard in "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" -- "Here's the world's best textbook --- an honest newspaper."

Expand full comment