By JIM PUMARLO, Consultant
We’re more than halfway into 2023, and many local governments are well involved in exploring 2024 budgets.
Are your newsrooms aware of the process? Are you keeping readers abreast of the dynamics? It’s not too early to brainstorm ideas for timely and meaningful coverage.
Shaping and adopting budgets often takes months encompassing hours of meetings and hundreds of pages of documents. Yet most newsrooms likely observe and report only a snapshot of the process.
I’ve long regarded editorial pages as the conscience of a community. Nothing better represents the marketplace of ideas than a rich exchange of letters.
By Jim Pumarlo, Consultant
At the same time, editorial pages should not be a free-for-all. Guidelines must be set.
By Jim Pumarlo, consultant
How will the Legislature deal with a record budget surplus, and what will it mean for taxpayer pocketbooks? Are there implications for public safety with the proposal to legalize marijuana? Which communities are the winners and losers in the proposed state bonding bill?
Minnesota lawmakers are addressing these and myriad other issues as they pass the halfway mark of this year’s session. The list is representative of the topics debated and public policy crafted in legislative hallways everywhere.
Editors often raise red flags – or at least hesitate – at requests for business news, and often for good reason.
By Jim Pumarlo, consultant
Here’s a periodic action item for every newspaper: The exercise can be quite revealing in evaluating how you are connecting with various audiences. It is even more important in today’s fractured media landscape and as everyday interaction can still be challenging in the aftermath of the pandemic.
For starters, ask reporters to identify the community newsmakers in a brainstorming session. Better yet, divvy up newspapers from the last several weeks and circle the names and faces in the stories and photos.
By Jim Pumarlo, consultant
By JIM PUMARLO
Consultant
By JIM PUMARLO, consultant
By Jim Pumarlo, consultant
By JIM PUMARLO, Consultant
Are you looking for a project that can energize your news staffs, generate new advertising revenue and underscore the value of a local newspaper to potential new subscribers?
Mark Oct. 28: National First Responders Day.
Full disclosure on two fronts.
First, highlighting the accomplishments of first responders is not my original idea. I picked it up while presenting earlier this year at a Management Boot Camp sponsored by the Texas Center for Community Journalism.
By Jim Pumarlo, Consultant
Crime and public safety are garnering more headlines across the country. Law enforcement and racial disparities in the criminal justice system are under increasing scrutiny. Newspapers play a key role in examining the dynamics in their own communities.
But what’s happened to police logs, the most basic of public safety reporting? Where are the regular records of traffic citations, thefts, property damage, burglaries and much more?