The findings in this report are based on information in a comprehensive proprietary database that is created and maintained by the Local News Initiative at Northwestern University. Over the past year, faculty and researchers in the Medill School of Journalism, Media & Integrated Marketing Communications have collected data on more than 6,400 local newspapers, 1,100 public broadcasting outlets, 950 ethnic media outlets and 600 digital sites. The information is derived from a variety of industry and government sources, and supplemented with extensive research and reporting, fact-checking and multiple layers of verification.
- Newspapers: Information on individual newspapers in the database was derived from a number of industry sources. Membership lists provided by the 50 state press associations were cross-referenced with news industry stories published in 2022 and 2023, as well as data available from Editor & Publisher, SRDS and the Alliance for Audited Media (AAM). Researchers then conducted extensive independent online research, ascertaining the status and content of newspapers by checking websites and print versions, and also interviewing press association directors, editors and publishers when appropriate.
- Independent Digital-Only News Sites: The list of local digital news sites was compiled by merging lists published online by the Local Independent Online News Organization (LION) and the Institute for Nonprofit News (INN). As with newspapers, researchers then visited all of the websites to verify that the content was updated regularly, and the domain was still active.
- Public Broadcasting: The list of public radio and television stations came from data supplied by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. To determine whether a station produced original content, we reviewed individual stations’ schedules and staffing, as well as content posted on the station’s website.
- Ethnic Media: The list of ethnic media outlets active in 2020 was compiled using lists of ethnic newspapers in the Editor & Publisher DataBook (2004 and 2018), the Craig Newmark School of Journalism’s (CUNY) State of Latino News Media, the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA, an association of African American newspapers) and the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters (NABOB). In this 2023 update, we checked each outlet to determine whether it was still actively producing news content for its community and recorded the frequency of publishing. Using our research in the broader database, we were able to classify the presence of these ethnic media outlets in news deserts, high poverty areas and metro areas.
In addition, we used media information contained in numerous surveys and reports by, among others, the Pew Research Center, the Poynter Institute, the Tow Center for Digital Journalism, Agora Journalism Center, and the Knight Commission on Trust in Media and Democracy, as well as scholars and researchers at the nation’s universities, including the foundational data compiled between 2012 and 2020 by the Hussman School of Journalism and Media at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Demographic and economic data from both state and national government sources, including the U.S. Census Bureau, the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, were also incorporated and analyzed.
Building and Refining the Newspaper Database
Our 2023 report identifies 6,005 local newspapers in the country – 1,213 dailies and 4,792 weeklies – that were still being published at the end of September 2023. (We excluded the four large national newspapers – The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post and USA Today – from our analysis to focus on large regional and small local newspapers.) Each newspaper in the database has the following variables: name, city, state, parent media company, frequency (daily/weekly), number of days published per week, and (when available) total circulation. Our research is concerned with identifying local newspapers that provide public-service journalism. Therefore, in addition to using industry and press association lists, we add an additional layer of verification. When possible, we consult both online and print editions of newspapers, analyzing the content of several editions of a paper, to ascertain if the paper covers local government meetings, such as school boards and county commissioner meetings. Intentionally excluded from our proprietary database are shoppers, community newsletters (which focus on people and events, instead of news), specialty publications (such as business journals and lifestyle magazines), monthly and biweekly publications, advertising inserts, TMCs (Total Market Coverage publications) and some zoned editions that feature minimal local journalism relevant to the county where the zoned edition circulates. Many states and municipalities have different thresholds for determining whether a newspaper is a “paper of record” and therefore eligible to carry legal notices. Often that threshold is based on circulation and distribution. We recognize that the income from legal advertising is critical to small dailies and weeklies. Therefore, we can work with the executive directors and general counsels at individual press associations if there are questions or concerns about the difference in our methodology (which is focused on news coverage) versus the threshold used by government officials to determine whether a publication is eligible to receive legal advertising.
Building and Refining the Digital Database
Our 2023 report identifies 541 digital-only news operations that focus on producing either local, regional or statewide coverage of events and issues. This includes 407 sites that cover local news and 134 that cover statewide or regional issues. Excluded are those sites associated with existing or legacy media – such as sites for public and commercial broadcasting stations, newspapers and magazines – as well as national digital operations, such as ProPublica and Inside Climate News. We also exclude sites that are focused primarily on entertainment or event coverage, government and commercial sites (such as those operated by real estate companies) and those that have been inactive for the past six months. Each site in the digital database has the following variables: name, city, state, nonprofit or for-profit designation, news focus (local, regional or state focus), specialties (i.e., specific focus on topics such as politics, business or education), year established and founder or publisher/owner. As with newspapers, we add an additional layer of verification, analyzing the content of the sites, seeking to ascertain whether each site provides coverage on any of the eight topics identified by the Federal Communications Commission as being “critical information needs.”
Building and Refining the Public Broadcasting Database
There are more than 1,100 public radio stations in the United States. Roughly 65% of these are repeater or affiliate stations that are excluded from our consideration. The remaining 380 stations do not all carry local news content; some primarily schedule jazz or classical music, others are event-focused, and others simply repackage national available content. We manually reviewed the news content provided by each of these 380 stations and identified 213 that actually have original local journalism. This forms the core of our public broadcasting database. On the television side, there are nearly 350 PBS stations and affiliates across the country, but only nine have a local news program that airs at least three days a week, according to data compiled by Robert Papper, Syracuse University professor and director of the annual Radio Television Digital News Association survey of all the nation’s commercial and public broadcasting stations. Employment numbers were provided to us by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The numbers are limited to only NPR or PBS employees and do not include staff who may be paid through grants, sponsorships or donations from other sources.
Building and Refining the Ethnic Media Database
Our original list of 950 ethnic and minority news outlets was assembled by the University of North Carolina in 2020 from several sources, the Editor & Publisher DataBook (2004 and 2018), the Craig Newmark School of Journalism’s (CUNY) State of Latino News Media, the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA, an association of African American newspapers) and the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters (NABOB). As with all of our data, ethnic and minority outlets were included only if they provided local news coverage about their communities. For this update we manually checked each of the 950 outlets in the 2020 list to determine whether they were still active, leaving us with a final 2023 list of 723 outlets. This core list of outlets, including traditional newspapers, websites and TV and radio stations, will serve as a foundation as we continue to expand this dataset over the coming years.
Dealing with Circulation Limitations
The circulation figures in our 2023 report come with a number of limitations. Some circulation figures are audited and verified; others are self-reported. Therefore, we have incorporated additional verification steps and information in an attempt to be as transparent as possible about where we are getting the numbers. When possible, we use circulation numbers for paid weekday circulation from the Alliance for Audited Media (AAM). AAM is the industry leader in media verification and specializes in verifying circulation metrics for publishers. However, only 10% of papers in the database – mostly dailies – currently subscribe to AAM audits, which count both paid print and digital subscriptions in the total number. Additionally, the reported AAM numbers for the large dailies often lag behind the audit by a year or more. Because news organizations must pay AAM to verify their circulation statistics, many small papers do not use the service and instead self-report. In addition to AAM, we also have consulted SRDS and E&P datasets. When available, we used circulation figures provided by state press associations. There is currently no widely accepted and easily accessible tracking system for online readership data, especially for the thousands of local papers in small and mid-sized markets.
Tracking Sales, Changes in Ownership, Mergers and Closures
Throughout the year, the Local News Initiative tracks changes in ownership of newspapers, digital-only news outlets and ethnic media organizations, as well as closures and mergers, through news accounts and press releases, as well as extensive online research, consulting a number of industry sources. We define a closure as a newspaper or news outlet that ceased publishing and a merger as a newspaper that has been combined with another publication. We classified digital sites as either closed (with a date listed for closure) or inactive (if the site has not published any content for more than six months.) We consult:
- Publicly available corporate documents, including quarterly and annual reports released by the individual media companies, and press releases by Dirks, Van Essen, Murray & April; Cribb, Cope & Potts; and Grimes, McGovern and Associates, three of the most active firms in the U.S. handling sales of newspapers and digital sites.
- Numerous news articles about individual purchases and business decisions.
- Statements made by executives in press releases, news articles or industry presentations.
- Reports and interviews with industry representatives and analysts.
There are limitations to all of the above sources. Press releases, news articles, statements made by news executives and reports from industry analysts often list by title only the sales of the largest and most prominent newspapers in a chain, usually dailies. The weeklies involved in the sale, as well as specialty publications (including shoppers and business journals) and digital sites, are often grouped together and reported as a single number. That is why we try to check all announcements of sales against publicly available documents and corporate websites.
This research was overseen by Senior Associate Dean Tim Franklin, John M. Mutz Chair in Local News and director of the Local News Initiative, Penelope Muse Abernathy, visiting professor at Northwestern University and co-author of the report, and Sarah Stonbely, Project Director and co-author. Inquiries about the findings or insights in this report can be addressed to: stateoflocalnews@northwestern.edu.