Community Depends on Vibrant Local News Sources
By Beverly Faxon
The Oxford University Press traditionally picks a word of the year, and this year, it was “brain rot”— a deterioration of one’s mental state resulting from consuming too much “trivial or unchallenging” material.
Right now, if I were to pick the word I keep hearing, reading (and writing about) in 2025, it would be “community.” Fostering community can be a hopeful solution in a divided world. Yet, how do we get keyed into what is happening in our local communities? Where do we get our local news? Finding, and reading, those news sources may be a good way to get us actively engaged—and a good antidote for brain rot.
Noting a lack of local news sources, a Fort Wayne, Indiana resident replied to a 2023 American Journalism Project survey by saying, “If a Zombie Apocalypse broke out where I live, I’d probably be late to know about it.”
Riveted by national headlines and buffeted by sometimes sensational and often trivial social media, many of us may feel like we are one step behind the Zombies when it comes to knowing what goes on in our own backyards.
The Journalism Project explored what people wanted from local news. Interaction with 5,000 people nationwide showed that those people value local, verified news sources and often feel they can’t find information about what is happening in their own communities. Especially in polarized regions, they want “less emphasis on controversy, and more emphasis on basic, factual information.”
Such news sources are diminishing, replaced by scores of less verifiable, less local, and often partisan sources found on social media or cable news. “Partisan news” sources are juxtaposed with the concept of “independent news.” Historically, independent news has referred to news that is not subject to government control or influence (as opposed to state-controlled media).
The term “independent news” is now also used to mean free of corporate or institutional influence. Whether or not a news source is both independent and reliable has a lot to do with there being a clear line between fact-based news and opinion, and also a clear line between news or editorial content and the business side of the publication.
The Associated Press reported in fall of 2024, “More than 3,200 papers have closed since 2005, leaving about 5,600 in existence.”
Such closures lead to news deserts, especially in terms of local news dissemination.
Close to home, the prospect of one such closure rocked the town of La Conner when owner and publisher Ken Stern, seeking to retire in 2024, tried to sell the La Conner Weekly News. The Weekly was reported to be the state’s longest continually running weekly paper, publishing since 1879.
Here in Skagit Valley, we are fortunate to have more than one source of local news. To get a better idea of the role and value of local news sources, I spoke recently with two of those sources—the Salish Current and the new La Conner Community News.
Salish Current
Publisher Amy Nelson and Executive Editor Mike Sato of the Salish Current saw an emerging need when they began the weekly digital publication in 2020, coincidentally as COVID cases were showing up in Washington State.
Says Mike, “Amy was really the founder. She interviewed about 300 people in Whatcom, Skagit, and Island counties, and they commented on a lack of local news. Our idea was not to compete with daily papers, but we could complement them by covering things they couldn’t.”
Mike says the Salish Current operates under two guiding principles: the belief that “news should be freely available to all” and that “news has to be reported according to journalistic standards, fact-based, the best available truth.”
Along with free access, the Current embraces a non-profit model. Funding comes primarily from those subscribers who also choose to donate and from grant foundations. There are no ads.
The adherence to journalistic standards is key to fulfilling another urgent need. Mike notes that watching how misinformation and disinformation can emerge and gain traction has affirmed the role of a free press. By offering verifiable local news, a free press “could be a linchpin, providing a shared body of information to help restore trust among the community and in institutions.”
Notes Mike, “When we started it was during Covid anxiety. And now, we again see anxiety. What got us through then was community. It doesn’t matter if you are a red state or blue state, what got us through was community. And a publication is a community talking to itself.”
The Current now sends out both daily and weekly news with a focus on government and criminal justice, environment, agricultural and public health issues, commerce and industry, education, and social justice. It encourages lively, but civil, public opinion in the form of letters to the editor and Community Voices essays.
The focus is on Skagit, Whatcom, and Island counties, the Current works to show connections between the three: “If there is an ag story coming from Skagit, then we ask our reporter to touch base with communities in Whatcom or Island. We want to show how these three counties are a community—economically, environmentally, and in terms of shared legislative districts.”
Asked what the political moment brings to local news and the Salish Current, Mike replies, “Media will be in the crosshairs. Strings may be jerked— jerked financially, legally, and in terms of libel—but independent news is not subject to public grant freezes, and unless there is a move to revoke not-for-profit status, independents should be free to report on local news. And on how national news affects us locally—it will be pretty crucial reporting.”
La Conner Community News
In La Conner, five years after the Salish Current got its start, Ken Stern and the citizen group wanting to buy the Weekly News were unable to agree on a price. The Weekly News closed down, but then the citizen group joined forces with Kari Mar as publisher to start the La Conner Community News. Staci Baird came on as editor.
Like the Salish Current, the La Conner Community News favors the non-profit model. Says Kari Mar, “There are three goals with this model: to create an enduring community good, to pay workers a living wage, and to be inclusive.”
Again, like the Current, there is no paywall. Says Kari, “We wanted everyone in the community to be able to read it.”
The Community News started digitally, with the intent to publish in print as well by the early spring. Kari says, “When I managed teams of engineers, one thing I argued for is reaching people where they are. In La Conner, more than half of the population is over 60, and they read a paper newspaper. So that is right for La Conner.”
But there are additional things Kari values about paper, “When you read in print, you are learning organically; you scan the whole page. That’s important because people curate their own news so much that they don’t see other points of view or things that could be of interest to them.”
She adds that while she loves the opportunity tech provides, “We don’t know what file formats will be around in 100 years, but a print paper will endure. I want the paper to be something that Swinomish and La Conner grandchildren will be able to look up in the future. And the only way I can guarantee that is with print.”
Kari finds “Community news is an antidote to the cynicism people have about national news. It is empowering the community to connect with each other and engage about public life. It is so different from the divisiveness we see in cable news shows, for example.”
She believes the Community News will be valuable for those who don’t live in La Conner as well, partly in terms of informing tourists about what is going on, but also because almost all communities are dealing with similar big issues—like emergency preparedness and climate change. She notes that the Washington Post recently did a story on the Swinomish and the work they are doing with their clam garden, the first of its kind in the nation.
And That’s Not All
The Skagit Valley is richer than many areas in terms of local news sources—both print and digital. The Skagit Valley Herald, in one form or another, has been offering news of the Valley since 1884. It sold most recently in 2017 to the Adams Publishing Group out of Minnesota. Although its newsroom has downsized from its peak, the Herald still offers local, as well as national, news five days a week, including a forum for school sports, obituaries, meeting announcements, classifieds, and letters to the editor. Other affiliated papers include the Anacortes American and Fidalgo This Week. Upvalley residents have access to the monthly Concrete Herald.
The Cascadia Daily News, out of Bellingham, which started up in 2022 after the demise of the arts and entertainment Cascadia Weekly, gears itself toward Whatcom, Skagit, and Island Counties to cover news, events, and features that encompass Skagit Valley. They print digitally daily and in print weekly.
We are fortunate to have a wealth of news sources, many of them taking in-depth looks at local issues. Now, more than ever, I am turning to sources of independent local news to let me know what is going on in my community so that I can be both informed and engaged.
Freedom of the press is not a given—and neither is fact-based local news. Like all things we appreciate and don’t want to lose (Organically grown food from local farmers? Local theater productions? Local music?), local news sources can endure, but only if we support them.
You can subscribe to any of these local publications online.
La Conner Community News is also a Tokens for Tomorrow group April–June. Anytime you bring your own bag to the Co-op, you can support them through our community giving program!
The Natural Enquirer
The Co-op’s own publication, The Natural Enquirer, which you are either holding in your hands or reading online right now, can’t be considered independent.
We exist to help further the interests and success of the Co-op and its mission. But we have also been an enduring source of news about what is happening in our local community. Over the years, we’ve reported on local farms, local organizations, and local doings.
Our circulation is 9,500, with 9,000 copies mailed out and 500 distributed in-store. Says General Manager Tony White, “We never have any leftovers.”
We’ve been around since 1981, and we’ve been printed on paper for the duration. We don’t know if that is some kind of national Co-op record, but we like to think that it is. Although we can’t promise we will be in newsprint forever, there are no current plans to change.
Editor Nicole Noteboom says of publishing on paper, “Simply put, our members love it! It's definitely an expense, but worth the cost. The Natural Enquirer is a great way for us to share important updates and uplifting news to a very captive audience. It also allows the Co-op to support local businesses by working with the local publishing company (whose own publishing efforts—in the form of local newspapers—continue to dwindle) and by offering low-cost targeted advertising to smaller companies and organizations. We're also able to support USPS, which I'd deem an essential government agency.”
She adds, “On a personal level, I love print and want it to live forever. I get tired of looking at screens and find it's easier to absorb information when I have it in hand—there's just something about flipping through an actual publication that lends itself to a more real-life experience. I also think continuing to print The Enquirer honors our Co-op's history and our quirkiness while also showcasing some talented writers right here in the Co-op, and in our Co-op community.”