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More dinosaur caterwauling...

http://www.courant.com/news/opinion/columnists/hc-hunter1001.artoct01,0,4602785.column?coll=hc-utility-opinion

Rumors Of Paper's Demise Greatly Exaggerated

Karen Hunter
Reader Representative

October 1 2006

The fourth-quarter blues. Over the past four years, the feeling has become inevitable at The Courant.

This year, however, I had planned to ignore the anxiety that seeps into the newsroom in the fall, when managers begin counting heads and analyzing the amount of space given to news stories in an effort to meet next year's budget expectations.

My concern, after all, is fairness and accuracy of news coverage. No one has yet announced layoffs in the newsroom, although NE will be shut down. Readers don't worry about The Courant's budget, at least not until they can't find their favorite sections, local reporters or must-read columnists in the newspaper.

This year, however, the discontent in some newsrooms owned by Tribune, The Courant's parent company, has reached new levels. After the publisher and the editor of the Los Angeles Times, Jeffrey Johnson and Dean Baquet, refused to cut their staff further as Tribune had directed, cheers could be heard in newsrooms throughout the country.

The movement spread to the Baltimore Sun, where last week 100 employees signed a letter to visiting CEO Dennis FitzSimons asking that Tribune "treat those of us who work here with the respect we deserve and make sure that The Sun has the resources it needs to maintain the quality that has allowed it to thrive. Either that, or sell The Sun to someone who will."

Courant staff members, as well as journalists at other newspapers where cuts have had a demoralizing effect, found a spokesman in staff writer Rinker Buck, who wrote an open letter to president and soon-to-be publisher Stephen Carver. The letter, published on the website of the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, made it clear Courant "employees reject the strategy of publishing an inferior paper."

Lately, it has been difficult to walk through The Courant's newsroom without bumping into a discussion about the newspaper's future. Wednesday's front-page story "Courant In Rumor Mill" about Tribune's financial troubles and possible buyers of The Courant brought a few readers into the discourse.

One reader's response was simple and direct: "Hooray - if The Courant is sold, maybe we'll finally see some balanced reporting (toward the conservative side) and some REAL local coverage."

Richard Gobeille of Simsbury took the opportunity to write, "Despite arguments to the contrary, The Courant is slowly dying off - in pieces." He listed the losses that countless readers have complained about over the years: Parade, NE, a local movie reviewer, pages of local news, seasoned editorial writers. The enhancements, such as At Home and Place, are rarely part of the discussion.

"Tribune has gathered together a host of news outlets," Gobeille wrote, "maybe in hopes of creating one single national newspaper, albeit without the much-needed recognizable regional bias that marks a newspaper like The Hartford Courant. ... All this does not bode well for The Courant, nor does it further the dissemination of important information necessary to the education of the public in general. ... It pains me to watch a once great newspaper die. I saw a number of daily newspapers die off in New York City after the forced resolution of a newspaper strike some decades ago. Losing any serious daily media source wasn't good then - and it most certainly isn't good now. Somehow, in my sadness, I almost feel the need to send flowers."

Do not send flowers yet. Yes, it is painful - for the news staff as well as readers - to watch the industry wrestle with its identity as Wall Street analysts and Internet enthusiasts circle, but The Courant's heart is still beating.

The anxiety at some Tribune-owned newsrooms has turned to hope for a local owner, one who understands the importance of the relationship between a newspaper and its community, one who knows that the only way for news organizations to thrive, to be able to continue to provide meaningful and important information to citizens, is to have the courage to invest in the future and that when that happens readers will follow, whether it's through the Internet, podcasts or the newspaper placed at their front door.

Despite the uncertainty, the news staff is pushing forward. Editors, clerks, photographers, online producers and reporters are brainstorming and planning a Courant that will continue to be meaningful to readers. Among coming changes is a beefed-up elections staff - thanks to the disintegration of NE - and new features in two weeks in the Business, Life and Connecticut sections and at courant.com.

The anxiety that marks the fourth quarter is not exaggerated, but The Courant is still kicking.

Karen Hunter, The Courant's reader representative. Contact her at 860-241-3902 or from outside the Hartford area at 800-524-4242, Ext. 3902, or by e-mail at readerep@courant.com.