File photo (Image credit: CFJC Today).

By Mel Rothenburger

ARMCHAIR MAYOR

ROTHENBURGER: It’s hard to imagine Kamloops without a print newspaper

Oct 18, 2023 | 5:08 AM

A TOWN WITHOUT A NEWSPAPER is a sad thing to see. We’ll get a first-hand view of it after Kamloops This Week publishes its last edition next Wednesday.

Yesterday’s announcement of the closure was a shock but not a surprise. Print newspapers have been falling like autumn leaves the past couple of decades and will soon be a thing of the past. Everything’s going online.

KTW was, at times, a good newspaper. Other times, not so much. But since The Daily News closed its doors in 2014, it’s been our only paper. When the Daily News closed, KTW announced “a new era of journalism” and expanded to three days a week. But it later retracted to two days, then back to one. And now, none.

I’m saddened less by the loss of a business called Kamloops This Week than I am about the loss of journalists and journalism in our community. Newsrooms are famous for competing with everything they have, striving to be first and best, then going for beers after work.

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Newspapers have to make money to live. Profitable newspapers can afford to hire good newsrooms. When profits decline, the first to go are reporters.

But while newspapers are a business, they’re a business with a special responsibility. They carry a sacred duty to tell us about our world, and to interpret it for us. It has to be about more than money.

Papers carry out their role in a way broadcast media just can’t — they have the ability to go beyond 20-second news clips.

A lot of readers are grieving today, and so are a lot of journalists, especially since two other newspapers, the Alaska Highway News and the Dawson Creek Mirror, published their own final editions this week.

There will be talk, and hope, that a new newspaper might spring up and make a go of it. It won’t happen.

Kamloops without a newspaper? Hard to imagine. But true.

I’m Mel Rothenburger, the Armchair Mayor.

Mel Rothenburger is a regular contributor to CFJC Today, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor. He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.

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Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or Pattison Media.