It’s been a long time coming, but the Ypsilanti Courier is now officially dead. Or, to be more accurate, it’s being reported that Washtenaw Now – the print publication that was created about a year ago when Digital First Media decided to consolidate the Saline Reporter, Milan News Leader, Chelsea Standard, Dexter Leader, Ypsilanti Courier, Manchester Enterprise, Ann Arbor Journal, and Belleville View – would be publishing its last issue June 25. To their credit, I never thought that they’d make it this far. Personally, I didn’t think they’d make it through 2010.
I wrote the following in December, 2006, just after I got word that the Courier would be closing its Ypsilanti office.
A little bird tells me that the “Ypsi Courier,” as of the end of this month, will no longer have a physical presence in Ypsilanti, the town it is supposed to be dedicated to covering. While I’m assured that the paper will continue to be published, I have my doubts that an editor in Bellville (where the operation will be retreating to) can really know, care about, and ultimately cover the news of our town in any meaningful, substantive way.
Of course, it was just a matter of time.
Local papers — real local papers — are disappearing in America. They’re being bought up by larger entities in the same way that local radio stations, over the course of the past decade, have almost all been rolled up by the likes of Clear Channel. It’s incredibly efficient, in that you don’t actually need to operate multiple news bureaus, etc, but it means that there’s very little in the way of local news, especially that which could be considered investigative. Generally, due to the economies of scale, ad revenues rise and costs drop, but they do so at a cost to the local community. (So, consolidation is good for shareholders, but not necessarily stakeholders.)
When the “Courier” was first acquired by Heritage Newspapers, it’s my understanding that they began by severely slashing staff. They hired EMU students and other part-timers to cover the absolute minimum of local meetings and events, they supplemented that bare-bones coverage with generic content from elsewhere, and they focused on ad sales. What we’re seeing now is just the next logical step…
And, since then, things have just gotten worse as the paper has continued to change hands, with each subsequent owner looking to extract a little more value by cutting more jobs and forcing those that remained to do more with less.
I may not have my history exactly right, but, from what I understand, the Ypsilanti Courier was created in 1994, after the Ypsilanti Press was sold to the Ann Arbor News, renamed the Ypsi Community News, and reborn as a Sunday insert. At that point, from what I’m told, former Mayor Cheryl Farmer, Dave Melchior, and others decided to launch their own weekly – the Ypsilanti Courier. The Courier published until 2004, at which time it was acquired by Heritage Newspapers. Heritage shortly thereafter sold its holdings to the Journal Register Company, which, not long after, went bankrupt. And, from there, the Courier went to 21st Century Media, which was eventually absorbed by Digital First Media, which also went bankrupt. And, according to the Saline Post, the handoffs many well have continued, if not for the fact that, a few weeks ago, predatory leveraged buyout firm Apollo Global Management backed out of a deal to purchase some, if not all, of Digital First Media’s “more than 800 multi-platform products.” And, with that, the Courier’s long death march has officially come to an end.
For what it’s worth, I don’t blame the employees of the Courier for anything that’s happened. As I discussed not too long ago with former Courier reporter Krystal Elliott on The Saturday Six Pack, I think all the blame lies with ownership, who, contemplating decreasing ad revenues in the internet era, chose not to invest in their papers, but instead to slash costs as much as possible in hopes of siphoning off a few more years of revenue. [Some of you may recall that the Courier attempted in 2012 to transition to a business model in which unpaid community members would produce content for them.] Owners essentially made the decision long ago to ride the horse they were on until it died, and today’s the day it finally collapsed beneath them.
Speaking of Krystal, I reached out to her today to see if she had any thoughts on the death of the Courier. Here’s her response.
What has me the most upset is that Washtenaw Now was the culmination of an entire county’s worth of community newspapers. The thing that made Heritage Newspapers and then Washtenaw Now strong was that it gave voice to these smaller towns so often ignored by the larger local outlets (until tragedy struck, of course). There was always a ton of competition in covering the news for Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor, but for Manchester, Milan, Saline, Chelsea, Dexter and all the surrounding townships, these community newspapers were it. Who is going to be sitting in on those school board and city council meetings now? Who’s going to report on those wonderful community events? Who is going to be keeping tabs when election season rolls around?
I know people often like to complain about their local news coverage, but there was (and is) a lot of potential in DFM’s reporting staff. I’m incredibly grateful of the time I spent there- I learned a lot about local news. But it’s really hard to consistently put out a good product with solid, hard-hitting news when you’re not supported or given the proper resources to do so. I’m really sad to see it go and I hope these great (and very hardworking) journalists are able to find alternative outlets where they can do what they do best: report the news.
As for the question I posed in the headline, I just visited the Courier’s website and I didn’t see any mention of the pending closure. [While the eight local papers were folded into one print publication, the Courier, and some of the others, still maintain independent web presences.] One would hope that employees would be given an opportunity to wrap things up in a way that allows them some semblance of closure, but my guess is that corporate ownership won’t allow that to happen.
