Corporate “community” newspapers usually fall short on community financial involvement

Four of the five newspapers where I have worked have been corporately owned. The current one is part of Granite Publications, which owns 20 mostly non-daily newspapers. Skipping the Today group in Dallas, family-owned by the two co-bosses struggling to rub two nickels together at times. I was at Jacksboro, Texas owned by behemoth MediaNews; Hobbs, N.M., owned by a company out of Lake Charles, La., that owned about 20-25 daily and non-daily newspapers, and Bonham, Texas, then owned by Indian Nation Publishing (not an Indian-owned company) which owned about the same number of papers. Both the Hobbs and Bonham owners had fairly significant non-newspaper investments and ownerships as well, i.e., motels, retail, etc.

None of these newspaper companies, at the level of these local newspapers, has invested back into the communities where I work any significant charitable contributions.

And, I know the usual arguments.

“We do that by running your charity’s press releases and pictures for free.”

“We do so by being community-focused.”

And on the business side:

“If we said yes to one charity, we’d have to say yes to all and we can’t afford that.”

On the first two points, while PR is nice, it’s no substitute for cold, hard cash.

On the next, I have several comments.

First, no you don’t. You can pick and choose where to contribute, even if that may involve local feelings.

Second, who says you can’t afford it? You can if you keep the donation small enough. And, the symbolism of donating something can be priceless as far as community marketing, especially if it’s a donation related to, say, Black History Month.

Third, it’s a fricking tax write-off. It partially pays for itself.

The owner of my current newspaper group can have publishers/ad managers meeting every year, PLUS a separate one for managing editors, at his deer lodge/ranch 200 miles away from some of the papers in the group, in part to give himself a nice tax write-off. Don’t tell me he can’t do the same with a budget for charitable contributions.

And, while newspaper owners may argue about shrinking profit margins, they still do a lot better than many other businesses. And the small-town “community” papers are the ones least affected by circulation declines in the industry.