A group of United States senators, including Mark Warner, D-Va. has introduced a resolution that would designate April as Preserving and Protecting Local News Month.
The idea behind the symbolic effort takes on a different reality in light of the story from McCurtain County, Oklahoma, where a group of local officials is being investigated after a recording surfaced in which the group discusses their knowledge of hit men and the location of two big holes in the context of complaints about two local news reporters.
The response from Kevin Clardy, the county sheriff: that the recording had been altered, and that it was made illegally, and could lead to felony charges against the newspaper’s publisher, Bruce Willingham, who had left a voice-activated recorder in a county commission meeting room on March 6 because he said he suspected the public body would continue to conduct county business after the meeting had ended in violation of the state’s Open Meeting Act.
On the recording, county commissioner Mark Jennings tells the group that he knew “where two deep holes were dug, if you ever need them,” to which Clardy responded, “I’ve got an excavator.”
Jennings later added that he knows “two or three hit men” in Louisiana, adding that “they’re very quiet guys.”
Willingham said local officials are upset about “stories we’ve run that cast the sheriff’s office in an unfavorable light,” including the death of Bobby Barrick, a Broken Bow, Okla., man who died at a hospital in 2022 after deputies shot him with a stun gun.
The newspaper has filed a lawsuit against the sheriff’s office seeking body camera footage and other records connected to Barrick’s death.
Reporters, editors and publishers are engaged in this kind of activity every day in every community in the United States, and while it’s not common that U.S.-based local reporters face threats of death for doing their jobs, what so many do to keep local and state government honest can be sensitive work.
Two decades of change in the media industry has local news outlets fighting to stay afloat from a bottom-line perspective.
This, in turn, has pushed employment in newspaper, television, radio, and digital newsrooms in the United States down 26 percent, or 30,000 jobs, from 2008-2020.
In addition, more than 100 local newsrooms nationwide were forced to close during the COVID-19 pandemic, with 30 percent of local television stations reporting budget cuts and staff reductions.
As of last fall, 42 local newspapers have closed or merged in Virginia alone, with significant staff cuts plaguing surviving papers.
The Senate resolution affirms the significance of local news in increasing civic engagement and strengthening democratic norms and practices, and acknowledges the valuable contributions of local journalism toward the maintenance of healthy and vibrant communities.
“In Virginia and across the country, local news outlets are relied on to keep our citizens informed, combat disinformation, and serve as a crucial check on our government institutions,” Warner said. “It is important that we continue to honor the hard work that local journalists do for our Commonwealth and for our democracy in the face of continued budget cuts, newsroom closures, and staff reductions that have made their work more challenging.”
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Chris Graham
