Star-Ledger announced some news of the own last night. They're doubling their staff at their statehouse bureau to cover Gov. Christie, the legislature, and the NJ Supreme Court. And, for their part, Politicker is launching their State Street Wire March 1. More coverage isn't necessarily better coverage. And we compete with both, for readers and to provide context for those readers. But I'm glad to see this happen in commercial news coverage because they've taken a lot of hits over the last few years, and both the Ledger and politicker have, and I read them both.
Three years ago, Star-Ledger laid off 40% of its newsroom staff, which the New York Times noted at the time was one of the largest reductions in a single move by a major American paper. The Times had just had its own round of editorial layoffs - a first for the Times - and was soon to lay off another 100 newsroom staff, and the national paper of record no longer covers New Jersey news as closely as it once did. Across the country newsrooms were and are hurting; advertising down, and costs up - from bedrock papers like the Times and Ledger to smaller, locally-essential weeklies. The Delaware Valley News, which covered the river towns along the New Jersey and Pennsylvania banks of the Delaware, closed three years ago too - the first paper I ever worked for. Around the same time, Politicker's national expansion took a dive, shutting down 12 state sites. (Juan Melli, who became Associate Editor at politicker.com 3 years after founding Blue Jersey, was out with that round of layoffs).
With massive shifts in editorial staffing have come changes, new ventures like newjerseynewsroom.com, formed out of the ruins of the Star-Ledger layoffs by journalists whose experience "adds up to over 1,000 years". And into the reporting void, hyperlocals are springing up to catch news a new way, in very focused geographical areas. Citizen's Campaign's new NJ Hyperlocal News Association is helping hyperlocals develop, an effort Blue Jersey is involved in, in our own small way.
The latest bad news for newspapers came in a one-two punch over the last few days. It was the last day at work for nearly half of Gannett's editorial staff with job losses at Courier News, Home News Tribune and Daily Record. One of those let go, Daily Record's political columnist Fred Snowflack, who outed himself as a Democrat on his way out the door. And - bad timing - that bill that would allow municipalities to post legal notices on their websites rather than requiring them to pay newspapers for the service. Newspapers, the Star-Ledger in the lead, are charging that this is less a cost-cutting option for government and less an effort by government to control their content and cripple them financially. Jury's still out on that one, for me.
So, I'm liking new reporting muscle at the state house. Good luck, Star-Ledger. Politicker too. Good luck.
Today's Quote of the Day is from the website of Gannett's Courier News and Home News Tribune, which posted their analysis of Gov. Chris Christie propensity to turn far too many encounters with his public into ugly confrontations.
The article discusses one of Christie's "YouTube moments" (as his staff calls them), and how he treated a member of his audience at a "Town Hall" in Parsippany. From Christie's confrontational style needs more limits:
And an incident like this, as minor as it is, should matter to New Jerseyans, because it suggests that Christie may be losing perspective on how to properly apply his power as governor. And that's dangerous.
This seems to be the week that Chris Christie jumped the shark. We're thankful it isn't just us calling him out for this crap. For a while there, it was awfully lonely trying to keep a jaundiced eye on this guy while the GOP faithful outside New Jersey hoisted him up as King, and the GOP inside New Jersey were giddy with the power he's throwing around.
The tipping point was the latest "Town Hall" in his home county of Morris, where he had his security bring a teacher half his size, who says he's a registered Republican, up to the stage where Christie waved his finger in the guy's face and gave him what for until he was done, then had security escort him off the stage and away before the guy could respond. Quite a show. Star Ledger wrote Christie's bully act getting old. Salon wrote Is New Jersey growing bored with shouty Chris Christie? (they'd already written Chris Christie loves yelling at people and called him "New Jersey cartoon"). Fred Snowflack, who covers Morris politics more than any other reporter, wrote Christie may need a boxing ring next time. And there's more. And there's going to be more.
Look, I was tired of Chris Christie before he was inaugurated. We've spent quite a lot of time here watching him carefully, so none of this is a surprise to us - or to you. But partisan politics aside, this behavior has got to stop. Time for the bad boy to grow up.
Fresh on the heels of strong marriage equality endorsements from South Jersey's two largest papers, now it develops that Central Jersey's two largest papers, the Courier News and Home News Tribune are joining the call for equality via the online news site they share. It is the right thing to do:
So this is a call for all of our state senators to show some leadership and courage, do the right thing and support gay marriage, even if that vote stands in opposition to the majority of your constituency.
That last part is crucial, because we recognize the enduring strong public resistance to the concept of gay marriage. For some it's a religious issue, a belief that a same-sex union doesn't fit God's view of marriage. For others it conflicts with long-accepted societal mores. And for others it's strictly a lack of acceptance of gays.
They deal head-on with those calling for a public referendum. This is not, they say, an issue to be left in the hands of the public to decide directly, not because it might fail, but because that's the easy way out for legislators, a mistake other states made that we shouldn't repeat. The comparison to racial inequality is inescapable. They remind us that we look back on indefensible Jim Crow laws. And it was legislative and judicial action that made it right, when a public vote would have failed. Quoting: Simply put, the public isn't always right. And nor should it always be granted the opportunity to make the decision, not on something this fundamental to America's core values of freedom and equality.
These are the hometown papers that Sen. Chris "Kip" Bateman reads. And Bateman, a Republican, still hopes for a way to "fix" civil unions, which we know does not exist. But what's important about him is that he's clearly struggling to find an answer that is right and fair. If you want to alert him to this editorial, and let him know you hope he votes yes, Bateman's District Office is (908) 526-3600. As always, of course, be polite and brief. Bateman's remarks at Monday's hearing were intelligent and searching. We can see he believes in equality. There's only one way to get there now.
The editorial urges us to remember we'll look back one day on "foolish biases" this issue raises. That it's "frankly embarrassing that we're still arguing this issue." Here's how they leave it:
Society shouldn't be drawing a line in the sand where sexual orientation fails to receive the same protections against discrimination as race or religion or gender. Gay marriage is, at its heart, about equality. And that is something that always deserves support.
We urge lawmakers to ignore all of the noise and the inflammatory rhetoric, the biblical interpretations and lessons in legal history, and look into their own hearts before casting their votes. If they do that, gay marriage will soon be legal in New Jersey, as it should be.
Gannett Co. Inc will take pretax write-downs of as much as $3 billion in the second quarter, as the publisher of USA Today contends with a slumping newspaper market.
The MyCentralJersey.com site (owned by Gannett, publishing the "reporting" from the Home News Tribune and Courier News) had this headline today (emphasis added):
Update: No relief as heat wave continues
Followed two paragraphs later by this sentence:
And while similar conditions are expected Tuesday, there is some relief in sight.
Gee, I wonder why that chain is losing billions? It couldn't be that they've gutted their local news staffs so badly that their headline writers can't even read the articles?
What's happened to local media in New Jersey and this country is a shame. Media consolidation is a disaster.
New Jersey newspapers' editorial boards are typically strongly on the side of tougher ethics laws and against pay-to-play, patronage and no-bid contracts.
But some of them have a blind spot when those same reforms encroach on their own turf.
Current law says that government notices must be published in newspaper ads. This could be the biggest no-bid contract written into law, and it's worth millions of dollars.
Assemblymen Cryan, Greenwald and Moriarty are proposing common sense legislation to let government entities post their notices online:
The Assembly members' measure (A-1105) would allow the state, counties, and municipalities to comply with existing publication requirements by allowing government and public bodies to post information and documents to the Internet, via the organizations' official Web pages.
As they note in the press release, it could also save the government money.
The bill will be put up for a vote on Thursday, and disappointingly, some newspaper editorial boards are against it. Today the Home News Tribune spoke out in an editorial titled Web poor venue for public notices:
Not everyone has or even wants a computer in their home, let alone Internet access, and wouldn't know how to surf the Web if they did. A lot of senior citizens come to mind, and it just so happens that seniors as a group tend to be one of the most involved public constituencies in local government affairs. Too many would be left in the dark if legal notices no longer appeared in print.
Besides the fact that anyone can get online at public libraries, this is circular reasoning. Seniors use the internet less and are more politically involved, so the law should cater to them? I could just as easily argue that youth use the internet more and are less politically active, so this would be a good way to facilitate and increase voter participation.
The Internet also remains a complex maze of sites and search themes that can be difficult to navigate even for regular users. Locating a key piece of information can often become the proverbial search for a needle in a haystack, even if the online user does reach the proper source.
I've got two words for them: the google. (minor tangent: If they want to make information easy to find, they could insist that newspapers publish their corrections on the front page as prominently as the original story instead of burying it in micro fonts).
A recent poll found that 48% of respondents said the internet is their primary source of news, while only 10% said the same about newspapers. If they're really concerned about leaving people in the dark, they should quickly drop their opposition to this bill.
Update: The Courier Post acknowledges the conflict of interest in their position, and then opposes the legislation.
All this nonsense makes me want to listen to some real technobabble. Spin it, DJ Stevens!
In the sleepy Middlesex County burg of Highland Park, a group of anti-war demonstrators has been meeting every Saturday morning for one of the longest-running and most consistent Iraq War vigils I've ever heard of.
The local prints have covered the vigil and related activities from time to time. Some of the stories are good; some of them not so good. Some of the stories deal with the factual points and issues raised by the demonstrators; some go for the cheese and highlight things that can be twisted to fit the stereotype of anti-war protestors as a bunch of leftover hippies who are only doing this because the Grateful Dead broke up. The vigil goes on anyway.
This column in the Home News and Tribune is one of the best pieces I've read. It emphasizes the human interest angle but never loses sight of the looming disaster that brings these people (disclosure: I'm married to one of them) together every Saturday morning - even bitterly cold ones like last week. So let's give credit where due - to the writer, and to his subject.
