Bankruptcy is a scary word. But that doesn’t change our commitment to local journalism.
We’re still here.
Last week, the parent company of the Sun Herald filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection so that it can restructure and emerge as a financially stable, digitally focused media company. How those proceedings play out for the McClatchy Co. will continue to make national headlines in coming weeks.
But I want to focus on us here, on the Coast. I want to answer some of the questions I’ve heard in the community, namely what this means for our readers and long-time subscribers.
The bankruptcy will have no immediate impact on the Sun Herald’s daily operations. We’ll still publish the latest breaking news on our site and continue to print our paper every day but Saturday.
To be clear, we’re not going out of business. We’re still in Gulfport, on DeBuys Road, where we have been for years.
I often tell people that we have the best newsroom in the company, filled with 20+ year veterans who call the Coast home.
Our goal is to deliver news found nowhere else. We deliver often.
Staff writer Anita Lee, for instance, recently told our readers how a contractor is threatening in a federal lawsuit to stop work on Margaritaville Amusement Park over what it says are $5 million in unpaid construction bills.
Staff writer Margaret Baker in January used her extensive network of law enforcement contacts to break the news that a fugitive suspected of faking his own death had been captured in Colorado. And staff writer Mary Perez just had a story about the Coast having more clout in Jackson after multiple election victories.
Videographer Alyssa Newton penned a story in December about a horrific dog shooting in Pearl River County, and it turned out to be one of the most successful stories in Sun Herald history in terms of online page views. And reporter Patrick Magee often breaks stories on coaching changes and other developments at Coast high schools and at Southern Miss.
These are just some of the stories we’ve produced in recent weeks that fulfill our mission of producing independent, fact-based, solutions-oriented, accountability journalism that serves South Mississippi.
With your support, we will continue producing these stories.
The local news industry has changed dramatically. We still earn revenue from print advertising, but not nearly as much. Readers and advertisers have moved online, where Google and Facebook consume most advertising dollars.
We depend now more than ever on digital subscriptions to generate the revenue that covers our newsgathering efforts. We hope you will consider subscribing so that the Coast will continue to have in-depth local news. We’ve put a great deal of effort into offering our readers a superior digital news report. We post breaking news quickly and have for years now been producing videos for sunherald.com.
All we ask from you is to keep reading and supporting the Sun Herald. We’ll make you proud.
Blake Kaplan is the Sun Herald’s executive editor and general manager.