How to Free the Press

HOW TO FREE THE PRESS
[SOURCE: The Nation, AUTHOR: John Nichols]
[Commentary] What's needed is a new model for old-media ownership, and it's just possible that one could come out of the Knight Ridder newspaper sale. A union-friendly private-equity firm, Yucaipa Companies, is bidding against several of the country's more unsavory chains for the twelve papers, most of which are unionized. If it succeeds, newspaper employees could over time buy ownership of a new corporation set up to run the papers. "It will start off 100 percent owned by Yucaipa and then more and more by employees," explains Newspaper Guild president Linda Foley. "We would like it to be majority-owned by employees, eventually 100 percent." McClatchy has erected barriers to the bid from Yucaipa, a firm run by billionaire Ronald Burkle. And even if Yucaipa overcomes those obstacles and buys all or most of the dailies, the papers will still have to struggle with the shifting realities of a newspaper business where circulation rates and advertising revenues are generally in decline, and where the costs of paying reporters, maintaining news bureaus and pursuing investigations keep going up. Even a model that frees newspapers from the pressures imposed by the greediest investors will not necessarily usher in an era of journalistic freedom and excellence. But the Yucaipa bid offers some hope that, while the Project for Excellence in Journalism is right that "the news industry is beginning to move into the next era," newspaper journalists may still be able to earn a fair wage for asking tough questions of those in power.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060417/nichols