By Linda Stamato
Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s first budget is receiving heavy scrutiny, understandably. While it will earn praise for efforts to improve regulatory functions and increase transparency, it also deserves criticism in some areas.
One proposal that falls squarely into that category is the elimination of funding for the New Jersey Civic Information Consortium.
The Consortium is unique to New Jersey. Since its inception, it has addressed gaps in local news by investing in journalism, community reporting, and digital media innovation. It has awarded more than $12 million in grants, reaching 19 of the state’s 21 counties and supporting a wide array of media organizations, including Morristown Green.
The program has become an essential force in strengthening local journalism and helping news organizations provide communities with the information they need. As the New Jersey Monitor observed: “Access to healthcare, education, jobs, housing, food — all of it runs through who you know and what information you can find.”
Each year, the challenges intensify. As newspapers close, news deserts expand.
When local news disappears, civic and political life suffers. Communities lose access to information about issues that directly affect them. Local news organizations report on proposed developments, government decisions, school board actions, and the work of community institutions. They hold public officials accountable by shining a light on government activities and informing residents about decisions being made in their name.
Their coverage is consequential in smaller but meaningful ways as well. They document the ceremonies, programs, traditions, and accomplishments that define a community’s culture and history.
Fortunately, local news organizations have not lacked for effort or innovation. With Consortium support, they have experimented with collaboration, developed new programming, launched websites, and explored new approaches to serving audiences.
That is why the proposal to eliminate Consortium funding has been met with concern.
When citizens play an active role in sustaining local news, they recognize that their communities—and, in many respects, our democracy—depend upon it. Communities without reliable local news generally experience lower levels of civic engagement, less government accountability, and diminished public trust.
CONTENDING FORCES
Let’s face it: Local news is often unpopular. Accurate reporting can create uncomfortable moments, particularly for public officials—mayors, council members, school board members, and others—who may find the truth less than flattering.
A recent report from the Computational Media Lab at Rutgers University’s School of Communication and Information illustrates the challenge. It found an uneven landscape across New Jersey, with some communities receiving substantial coverage of government, education, and civic affairs, while others receive little or none.
Since 2005, New Jersey has lost 129 media outlets, including 58 percent of its print publications. The resulting gaps must be filled through creative efforts by the news organizations that remain.
Cutting support for local journalism is grossly shortsighted. Increasing it makes far more sense.
It is unrealistic to expect subscriptions and advertising alone to sustain local news. Both remain important, but many local sites provide unrestricted access, require no subscriptions, and operate with limited advertising revenue. They depend heavily on donations and philanthropic support.
Innovation is helping. News organizations are collaborating rather than competing, sharing reporting, training residents to cover community events, and finding new ways to broaden access to information. Many of these efforts are supported by the Consortium.
We know journalism needs new business models. Finding a sustainable path forward is more than a public good—it is a civic necessity. Local news is the lifeblood of a community and, as has often been said, the first draft of history.
Fred Friendly, founder of public television, understood this well. News coverage, he said, “should not have to stand the test of political popularity at any point in time. Its most precious right will be the right to rock the boat.”
We need to understand that and support it. Our lives, and our ability to make informed decisions, depend upon it.
Walter Lippmann warned of the consequences when citizens lack access to reliable information. In Public Opinion, often considered the founding text of media studies, he imagined citizens becoming “deaf spectators in the back row who arrive in the middle of the third act and leave before the last curtain, having stayed just long enough perhaps to decide who is the hero and who the villain of the piece.”
Lippmann also believed democracy often asks more of citizens than they are willing or able to give. “It imagines that they know everything, or at least that they can or want to know everything, when in fact they know little, can only know little and are happy with the little they know.”
To prove him wrong, journalism has its work cut out for it—and so do we. The least we can do is support local news, read it, and remain active, engaged citizens capable of meeting the responsibilities of democracy.
Government has a role to play as well. In New Jersey, the Civic Information Consortium has become an important part of that effort.
Governor Sherrill, don’t take it down.
WATCH LINDA STAMATO ON NJ PBS ‘STATE OF AFFAIRS’
Linda Stamato is a trustee of the Morristown and Morris Township Library Foundation, and a member of the nonprofit Corporation for New Jersey Local Media. At Rutgers, where she is a Faculty Fellow, she is co-director of the Center for Negotiation and Conflict Resolution at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy. She also is a former commissioner on the Morristown Parking Authority.
Opinions expressed in commentaries are the authors’. In this instance, they do reflect those of this publication. Morristown Green’s coverage of Greater Morristown has been made possible in part by support from the New Jersey Civic Information Consortium.
Morristown has a long history of people stepping forward in pivotal moments.
When you chip in to Morristown Green, you’re helping your neighbors stay informed, strengthening our civic backbone, and carrying on the spirit that’s defined this town since its earliest days.
Rally for local news.
I agree. I guess we shall see soon enough. Thanks!
Supporting the Civic Education Consortium seems to be such a no-brainer that one can’t help but wonder how Sherrill defends her decision to defund it.