Once upon a time, small-town newspapers were owned by local families who actually cared about things like city council corruption, high school football scores, and who won the pie contest at the county fair. Now, they’re being swallowed by hedge funds that wouldn’t know a Lubbock tornado from a Wall Street one. A new report from Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism says independent papers are disappearing faster than a West Texas raincloud — and what’s left is owned by investment firms that treat journalism like a distressed asset, not a public service.
Half of all papers that closed in the past year were small, family-owned outlets. Meanwhile, the big dogs — companies like Gannett and Alden Global Capital — just keep consolidating. Translation: your “local” news is now being edited from a cubicle farm in Austin by someone who’s never been to your city, let alone your neighborhood.
The numbers are grim: 38% of U.S. newspapers have died in the past two decades. Over 200 counties now have zero local news source. But sure, tell us again how “Facebook groups” will fill the gap. Because who needs trained reporters when your cousin’s conspiracy memes are free?
Here in Lubbock, our own Avalanche-Journal is proudly owned by Gannett — the same media conglomerate that runs USA Today and about 200 other papers exactly like it. Once upon a time, it was run by the Morris family, who at least lived in the same time zone. Then came GateHouse Media, which promised “innovative local journalism” right before merging into Gannett and laying off half the staff. Now the A-J is part of a company more famous for “content syndication” than reporting.
