PERSPECTIVE FROM THE 19^TH HOLE:  This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon, as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.

The headline in this blog – not necessarily new news in this day of the prevalence of social media – is not good news for me.

You see, I am a newspaper junkie.  I like to get ink on my hands!

When I was growing up, I thought I wanted to be a newspaper reporter, perhaps with the beat of covering sports.

That never materialized as a career, though I did work for a daily newspaper in Oregon, the Daily Astorian, where I covered local governments — the city council, the county commission and the Port of Astoria, augmented by covering local, high school sports on evenings or weekends.

It was a good life in my first professional position after college.

When, from Astoria, I returned to Portland where I had grown up and later went on to Salem, I always retained my love for newspapers.

It was a few years ago that even that changed – at least a bit.

When the Oregonian and Statesman-Journal newspapers became mostly nothing more than small print versions of what was already on-line, I went with the flow.  I cancelled my subscriptions and went on-line, albeit with cleaner hands.

I also added the on-line editions of two national newspapers, which still participate in solid journalism – the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post – sometimes with the additions of the New York Times and Atlantic Magazine.

I also read the fairly new Salem Reporter, an effort led by my friend Les Zaitz to develop real news about Salem – don’t forget it’s the state’s Capital, which means there is lots of news there, despite the demise of the Salem Statesman-Journal.  Zaitz, by the way, is one of Oregon’s best journalists, having worked for the Oregonian for many years.

If I read all of these on-line (it should be said that I still get the Wall Street Journal in our mailbox at home, not just on-line), I think I get a good cross-section of solid journalism – quality writing and different takes on issues roiling this country, including its political process, a democracy under attack.

So, it was that I read a piece in PEW Research Reports, which chronicled the demise of newspapers, an unfortunate development in this country.  Here is the story’s lead paragraph:

“Newspaper chain McClatchy filed for bankruptcy this week, the latest bad headline for the struggling U.S. newspaper industry. McClatchy owns media companies in 14 states, including the Kansas City Star, Miami Herald, Charlotte Observer, Fort Worth Star-Telegram and Sacramento Bee.”

A few more excerpts:

• Newspaper circulation fell in 2018 to its lowest level since 1940, the first year with available data. Total daily newspaper circulation (print and digital combined) was an estimated 28.6 million for weekday and 30.8 million for Sunday in 2018. Those numbers were down 8 and 9 per cent, respectively, from the previous year. Both figures are now below their lowest recorded levels, though weekday circulation first passed this threshold in 2013.
• Newspaper revenues declined dramatically between 2008 and 2018.
  Advertising revenue fell from $37.8 billion in 2008 to $14.3 billion in 2018, a 62 per cent decline.
• Newsroom employment at U.S. newspapers dropped by nearly half (47 per cent) between 2008 and 2018, from about 71,000 workers to 38,000. Newspapers drove a broader decline in overall U.S. newsroom employment during that span.
• Layoffs continue to pummel U.S. newspapers. Roughly a quarter (27 per cent) of papers with an average Sunday circulation of 50,000 or more experienced layoffs in 2018. The layoffs came on top of the roughly one-third (31 per cent) of papers in the same circulation range that experienced layoffs in 2017. What’s more, the number of jobs typically cut by newspapers in 2018 tended to be higher than in the year before.

My hope is that such great newspapers as the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post will continue to practice solid journalism – in print, as well as on-line.  I also wish success for such local efforts as the Salem Reporter.  I intend to remain a subscriber of all.