Why local news must survive COVID-19

Being stuck at home watching the world become infected is really a cracking way to appreciate the things you take for granted.

Normally the bane of my existence, I cannot wait to again ram myself onto my overcrowded morning train service. I drool at the prospect of a Sunday roast at the pub. And I cannot wait to see the joy on my daughter’s face when we return to the playground.

The novel coronavirus pandemic is also turning out to be pretty handy for helping some appreciate the things I love but that they might have taken for granted, like quality journalism. I’m one of the dwindling minority who can’t function each day without first reading the newspaper, and now many more are joining the club. When a threat is lurking, people still want “news they can use” from trusted sources.

But with the economy taking a battering, it’s likely the coronavirus epidemic will force more news outlets into an early grave. Even the mighty, taxpayer-funded CBC has curtailed its local journalism in the midst of the crisis.

And while it would be great if the temporary spike in appreciation for the news during corona became permanent, that is to choose hope over experience. Instead, we are destined for more decline, and we will be poorer for it. If you think the LRT or Rick Chiarelli are raging dumpster fires now, imagine the world without someone on duty to call them out. The paper you’re holding in your hand or reading on a screen (thank you) has been holding people to account for 175 years; wouldn’t it be great to see it around for another few centuries?

If they make it through the current crunch, local outlets will have to get much better at evolving, and much more quickly. There is no muscle — and barely any bone — left to cut. The surge of interest in news during the crisis ought to provoke a stark (and final) rethink, both within newsrooms and in government. Nothing should be off the table.

And while they’re doing that, let’s take a moment to imagine what our coronavirus response would look like without a properly functioning news industry: We’d all be left wondering if the crap we read on Twitter and Facebook was really true. In other words, it would be even more of a demagogue-fuelled hell. So consider adding a layer of flesh back onto your local paper by taking out a subscription during this hour of need. Sure, it’s not a cure but, like a fresh supply of face masks, it would help the professionals survive another day in the fight.

But even mass subscription won’t be enough to save the skill sets currently housed in our local media. For many, the legacy costs are simply too punishing and the remaining revenues too small. If no good crisis should ever be wasted, the news industry needs to translate any goodwill from its coronavirus coverage into bold change.

And with the government soon to be forced into serial bailout conversations, including of the media, the coronavirus is absolutely the right time for the Trudeau government to reconsider its existing and poorly thought-out media bailout. Re-targeting money toward local outlets with established newsrooms, perhaps by relieving some of those legacy costs in a one-time intervention, would present far less of a conflict-of-interest than ongoing subsidy. It would also give organizations some leeway to adopt new models using existing and experienced staff who know their beats.

In return, local outlets could focus all of their resources on local news. A local paper can’t out-pizzazz the internet and it can’t out-report the world, but it can dig up the backside of a local council, school board or court better than anyone. The coronavirus epidemic is a brilliant reminder of why accountability journalism matters: if our systems fail, we all lose.

And while they’re at it, news organizations should take their content off social media and have the courage to charge for their work. Let the swamp be the swamp, and keep journalism away from its fever, where its quality can be appreciated.

Andrew MacDougall is a London-based communications consultant and ex-director of communications to former prime minister Stephen Harper.