For more than three decades, journalism defenders around the world celebrated May 3 as World Press Freedom Day.
The day marks the anniversary of the Windhoek Declaration of 1991, which promoted a free and independent press in Africa. It is intended to celebrate the importance of a free and independent press and to raise awareness of journalists from around the world.
“World Press Freedom Day is a great recall of the importance of journalism and some of the questions facing journalists today,” Jennifer Henrichsen, assistant professor at Edward R. Murrow College of Communication, said Washington State University. “Whether physical or digital attacks or partisan policy, we know that journalism has been in crisis for a long time and at national and international level.”
According to a PEW research study published in 2021, the use of Newsroom in the United States has dropped by 26% since 2008. According to data compiled by the premises initiative at the Medill School of Journalism in the Northwestern University, more than 3,200 newspapers have been on average activity since 2005, with more than two per week of folding, on average.
While the decline in the national journalism industry has been well documented, Henrichsen and a group of Murrow school teachers recently published the most complete journal of journalism in Washington.
The report, “from the deserts of news to non -profit resilience: assessing the health of the Washington local news ecosystem,” examines the drop in the news industry from Washington State and offers suggestions to political decision -makers on what could be done to relaunch it.
“This is the most complete study to date of Washington and is also a reference for us in the state,” said Henrichsen. “Our intention is therefore to invest points of sale to move forward to try to have a feeling of trends.”
The report examined the media and interviewed journalists and civic leaders to study the health of journalism in Washington, and found a declining system.
“Unfortunately, the crisis reports of local news through the state, anecdotal or based on research, also seem to reflect what we found in Washington State,” said Pawel Popiel, assistant professor at the Murrow College.
According to the results, only 170 points of sale through the State offer daily information coverage, with about half of these points of sale with an annual budget of $ 250,000 or less.
The report revealed that two counties – Skamania and Ferry – are considered new deserts, which means that they lack a coherent and credible source of information for local information. In addition, five counties have only one media, while five others have only two points of sale.
“It is therefore in fact a problem to which Washington Write is wide, to a large extent, because the number of points of sale is important to understand the types of diversity of the media that exist in a particular field,” said Henrichsen.
The lack of outlets offering local coverage also means that there is a lack of media diversity, according to Popiel. The diversity of the media, he said, is essential to competitive coverage, a wider range of opinions and to ensure resilience integrated into the system.
“This is a problem that afflicts rural areas as much and sort of sparse as urban areas,” said Popiel.
Other points of sale throughout the state, revealed that the study has trouble hiring and retaining staff due to the drop in budgets, which can be partially attributed to a drop in advertising revenues.
The absence of staff to adequately report a coverage area means that points of sale are often left to make difficult decisions when they decide what to cover. For example, an outlet may have to choose to cover a meeting of the local school board or a report on a car accident which causes a delay throughout the city.
“You have to make very difficult choices when you have so few staff,” said Henrichsen. “And that, of course, has implications for the type of information that is covered and the type of information that people can get to browse their daily lives.”
The report, which was to provide an snapshot from the journalism industry, examined the data collected between November 2023 and December 2024, which means a recent announcement that the Cowles family plans to donate the spokesperson-review A recently trained non -profit community organization based in Spokane was not discussed.
“The non -profit model offers hope and optimism to many of those who care about the future of local journalism, because it can provide a sustainable financing model that allows an increase in responsibility relationships,” said Henrichsen.
But the model is not a “miracle solution,” she said.
“Non-profit outlets are also faced with challenges and closures, as evidenced by the recent trigger of the leading non-profit start-up, Houston Landing, and require innovation and continuous attention to the public, if they are durable and successful in the long term,” said Henrichsen.
The plan calls for the publisher Stacey Cowles and Cowles Co. of his family to transfer the ownership of the newspaper and grant a correspondence subsidy of $ 2 million to the non-profit organization, called the community journalism Lab, which was founded by the editor-in-chief of the current spokesperson, Rob Curley.
Although the report has examined the drop in the Washington news industry, he also offered decision -makers to support him. These include ensuring that local journalism is “considered a public good that is necessary for a healthy democracy,” said Henrichsen.
The recommendations also include the creation of subscriptions and commercial advertising in local federal tax deductibles, the supply of tax credits to hire journalists and the supply of direct subsidies to the media.
“When you think of the threats to which local news is faced with resource constraints to reduce subscriptions to a sort of talent pipeline that attracts journalists in an audience that may not be informed of the journalism crisis to legal attacks and others against the journalists themselves and the media, the range of solutions must be complete to fully respond to what is ultimately a structural and systemic problem.” said Popiel.
In recent years, federal and state legislators have sought to throw a rescue buoy from the journalism industry, to various degrees of success.
This year, the Legislative Assembly has planned to impose a surcharge on major research engines and social media companies with a gross income of $ 5 million or more, with the tax capped at $ 6 million per year. The Office of Financial Management estimated that the tax would increase $ 27 million in the year 2027, and an additional $ 102 million between 2027 and 2031, the funds distributed to printed, digital and disseminated media.
Although the proposal has died in a committee, the report examines “how additional financing mechanisms are necessary to try to guarantee that this resource crisis can be improved so that journalism can be strengthened in the state,” said Henrichsen.
A program that has found more support from the legislators is a two -year scholarship program through the Murrow College.
As part of the program, journalists in the first stadiums of their career are placed in state editorial rooms, including the spokesperson-review and spokane public radio, to cover under-declary beats, which include voting rights, housing and rural issues, among others.
In 2023, the Legislative Assembly appropriated $ 2.4 million for its operation, and the state budget currently being examined by Governor Bob Ferguson includes additional funds for the program, although it would receive around half of its previous financing level.
“The real measure of journalism is not whether it pleads people in civic life, but if it gives them information on information,” said Ben Sors, president of the Department of Journalism and Media Production. “It is therefore in a way the basis of reference that we must understand, that a free and functional press is not a luxury in civic life in the state of Washington, it is a necessity, and this requires maintenance, and this requires investments, and it must not only for journalists who work in these jobs, but for citizens who live in these communities.”
Note from publishers: This article has been updated to reflect that Pawel Popiel is an assistant professor, not an associate professor.