Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | March 19, 2018 | Worcester Business Journal 9 W CONFERENCE DINING Complete Package Pricing includes continuous and abundant refreshments and a delightful buffet luncheon. LOCATION Conveniently located in Waltham just off Route 128 and minutes from the MA Turnpike. BUSINESS MEETINGS 17,000 square feet of multi- sized meeting rooms with in-room technology and unsurpassed service. To discover the difference at Waltham Woods, call our sales office at 781.434.7499 and schedule a personal site tour or email conferencecenter@mms.org. www.ConferenceCenteratWalthamWoods.com Boston's Conference Center Located in the technology corridor surrounding Boston, the Conference Center at Waltham Woods is a full-service meeting venue. CONFERENCE Complete includes abundant delightful BUSINESS MEETINGS 17,000 square feet of multi- sized meeting rooms with in-room technology and unsurpassed service. To discover the difference at Waltham Woods, call our sales office at 781.434.7499 and schedule a personal site tour or email conferencecenter@mms.org. www.ConferenceCenteratWalthamWoods.com Boston's Conference Center Located in the technology corridor surrounding Boston, the Conference Center at Waltham Woods Boston's Conference Center Located in the technology corridor surrounding Boston, the Confer- ence Center at Waltham Woods is a full-service meeting venue. Providence Journal, Rhode Island $46 million 2014 Halifax Media Group (Telegram & Gazette), Florida $285.4 million 2014 Foster's Daily Democrat, New Hampshire $5 million 2014 Stephen's Media, LLC, Nevada $110.8 million 2015 Columbia Dispatch, Ohio $47 million 2015 Business Information Division of Dolan LLC, Minnesota $35 million 2016 ThriveHive, Quincy, Mass. $11.8 million 2016 Morris Publishing Group, Georgia $120 million 2017 E.A. Sherman Publising, Rhode Island $1.3 million 2017 Austin-American Statesman, Texas $47.5 million 2018 Holden Landmark Corp. (Worcester Magazine, Leominster Champion, etc.), Millbury, Mass. $1.2 million 2018 GateHouse acqusitions Media Group Price Year Source: New Media Investment Group Since 2014, GateHouse Media and its parent company, New Media Investment Group, has spent more than $900 million on acquistions of newspapers and other media groups. Here is a highlight of those transactions. Media consolidation means less local coverage GateHouse Media, the parent company of the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, purchased Worcester Magazine, the Landmark in Holden, baystateparent magazine, Grafton News, Millbury-Sutton Chronicle and Leominster Champion. GateHouse's move follows Denver-based Digital First Media, the parent company of the Fitchburg Sentinel & Enterprise, buying the Boston Herald. F L A S H P O L L Has media consolidation by a handful of large corporations impacted local journalism? COMMENTS: 6% No. While newspapers like the Telegram cover less the rise of smaller niche publications and blogs give us more total news overall. Yes. Local news coverage in my community has decreased. 39% "Small town community weeklies are filling the void that large company subscription based papers no longer fill." "The subscription-based papers are not worth reading anymore. The hyper-local small business owned papers that cover just one town and go to everyone in town seem to do a great job and are growing. I see them in more and more towns in the area." ahead will take its course based on how they're doing." The impact on local newsrooms GateHouse isn't the only Central Mass. newspaper owner cutting operat- ing costs. Denver-based Digital First Media closed the Fitchburg Sentinel & Enterprise office last month, opt- ing to have staff work out of their homes. "That's pretty amaz- ing," said Dan Kennedy, journalism professor at Northeastern University in Boston journalism profes- sor of having employees to work out of their homes. Practicing journalists acknowledge certain papers would no longer exist if GateHouse or Digital First hadn't stepped in and righted the financial ships, Kennedy said. "A lot of it depends on the indi- vidual circumstances of each paper, but in general, I think the idea of one corporate entity owned by a hedge fund operating hundreds of local news- papers is not especially good for jour- nalism or society," he said. GateHouse journalists do the best they can with the limited resources, and it's the corporate ownership of these newspaper that is leading to criti- cism of a decline in local news and a decline in civic participation, said Desmond McCarthy, a journalism pro- fessor at Framingham State University and advisor to the student newspaper, which has sent college journalists to GateHouse papers for internships. "The major problem is that a nation- al corporation is creating a media monopoly and then engaging in cost- cutting practices that are detrimental to the quality of these news outlets," McCarthy said. These practices, McCarthy said, lead to poor pay and high turnover in GateHouse's newsrooms. In the company's annual report, New Media referenced concern about retain- ing experienced employees, which is essential to the local journalism world where sourcing and developing rela- tionships are crucial. "A shortage of such employees, or our inability to retain such employees, could have an adverse impact on our produc- tivity and costs, our ability to expand, develop and distribute new products and our entry into new markets," the company said in the report. "The cost of retaining or hiring such employees could exceed our expectations, which could adversely affect our results of operations." Spencer Buell, a staff writer at Boston Magazine, had his first professional journalism job at the GateHouse weekly Arlington Advocate from 2013 to 2015, making $12.60 an hour working full time. GateHouse's success with its bottom line can't be denied, but this business model, which is largely the same across the local journalism industry, is discour- aging for young journalists, Buell said. "I've seen a lot of people get frustrat- ed and leave," he said. "Many leave the industry for good." Still the local news source, at a profit Despite changes in ownership and a smaller newsroom staff, the Telegram maintains a strong presence in the com- munity and at city hall, said Mike Angelini, chairman of law firm Bowditch & Dewey, who once consid- ered buying the Telegram as part of a local ownership group. "I read it every day," he said. "It's still a medium of choice for people interest- ed in what's going on in Worcester." Low wages, layoffs and cuts at com- panies like GateHouse and Digital First, he said, are a product of the capitalistic society in which we live. "It has to earn a profit. Otherwise, there wouldn't be anyone in this busi- ness," Angelini said. Yes. News content has given way to opinion pieces and biased coverage. 51% 4% No. I haven't noticed a change in news content regardless of a newspaper's owner. W

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