Caller’s assertion of newspaper’s demise not accurate

Journalists still toil daily to serve the public to the best of their resources and abilities

To quote Mark Twain, “the reports of my (or in this case, our) death are greatly exaggerated.”

At a time when “fake news” is all the rage, it’s hard to be the subject of such.

I recently fielded a call to the Leader-post offices that sadly wasn’t singular in its allegations.

“Well, you’re closed down,” the person insisted, followed by, “so where am I calling?”

I tried to assure the person we, the Leader-post, are most certainly operating, and still located on the corner of Park Street and Victoria Avenue in Regina, Sask.

“No,” the caller insisted. “You’re not there. Saskatoon maybe, but not in Regina.”

I tried again.

Politely.

“I’m quite certain I’m sitting in an office in Regina.”

So let’s hopefully, once and for all, clear up any lingering confusion. The Regina Leaderpost is still, to state the obvious, located in this city, where a team of reporters, editors and photographers continues to gather and report the news. I know, that big, bold “For Sale” sign that was perched on the front lawn, followed by the flaming red one that said “Sold” created some confusion. The building was sold; the Leader-post newspaper wasn’t.

And as it has since 1964, our office remains inside 1964 Park St., where we are now tenants instead of owners. What is in Saskatoon is our printing press, at our sister paper the Starphoenix.

It’s not the first such call I’ve fielded here at what my colleague Rob Vanstone affectionately refers to as Leader-post World Headquarters. And, sadly, it probably won’t be the last.

These days I feel somewhat like the little people in Dr. Seuss’s Horton Hears a Who yelling, “We are here! We are here!”

And if you’ll forgive a bit of self-indulgence for a fledgling columnist, today marks 30 years that I’ve been here at the LP, where I’ve had the opportunity to share this province’s stories.

I know some naysayers have newspapers dead and buried. But on behalf of the dedicated, hard-working journalists who toil daily within these walls,

I’d like to roughly quote Monty Python and the Holy Grail when I say, “We’re not dead yet.”

Smart phones were just a glint in Steve Jobs’ eye when I entered journalism, and Facebook, let alone its creator Mark Zuckerberg, wasn’t even born yet.

But where do you think the news that freely populates your iphone and Facebook pages comes from?

The medium may have changed; the message hasn’t.

Good journalism is needed more than ever. And I believe you’ll find it here each day, whether between the pages of our hard copy edition, our online paper, or on our web pages.

But it comes at a price. It’s like democracy, in that regard.

Contrary to some of the hot air blowing in from the south, the media is not the enemy. We serve the public to the best of our ability and resources.

Something else I’ve noticed in the passage of those three decades: as media outlets across this city condensed, communications offices expanded.

When I started in this biz, if I wanted to speak to the police chief, I called his office and got him on the phone. Sometimes he called me. Ditto if I wanted to talk to the guy at city hall in charge of getting the snow plows moving or who managed the burgeoning landfill.

Want to interview the person in government who ran some program?

I called them up.

Now, there are layers of communications people in all levels of government and services.

What took minutes — getting an interview — can sometimes take hours or even days to arrange. Good communications people are facilitators, who connect reporters with those who have the answers.

I thought a former Mountie in communications described it best in referring to his role as “truth ambassador.”

At their worst, they are gatekeepers, believing the job is to insulate the boss from ever having to face a pesky reporter, particularly if the issue is controversial.

In Ontario, Doug Ford’s PC government has created its own “Ontario News Now” network, making sure to get just the right spin out on stories, or at least what he believes is the “news.”

If ever there was a time to support journalism, it’s now.

It does matter.

And we are here.