Colorado based investigative weekly folds

Posted by Christie Silk on May 19, 2009 at 4:42 PM

Fort Collins (Colo.) is set to lose its investigative weekly paper, Fort Collins Now, the most recent paper to perish in the current economic climate, reports Editor&Publisher.

Dwight Brown, the paper's publisher announced the closure on Monday on its website "the slump that has hit the newspaper industry in recent years has swallowed yet another newspaper: The one you are currently reading."

The paper, founded in 2003 as The Fort Collins Weekly and purchased in 2007 by Swift Communications Inc., was committed to the in depth reporting of significant yet ignored issues of local interest. Yet the paper has struggled to cope with the decline of advertising revenue over the past year, symptomatic of the national economic slowdown. It will publish its last edition on Thursday, May 21.

"We have offered Fort Collins residents quality journalism, strong advertising, and a commitment to the community in recent years" Brown said, "but we just couldn't make it work financially."

Colorado is proving to be a potential case-study for the current condition of the American press. As local printed papers fall victim to the ostensibly inhospitable environment, online initiatives have developed with the aim of filling in the gaps left by their demise. The loss of the Rocky Mountain News has motivated a group of its former writers and editors to establish an online daily news magazine, the Rocky Mountain Independent, due to be launched this summer. The long term success of this alternative, of course, can only be judged with the passage of time, and forecasts are perhaps dampened by the failure of an earlier online production, the subscription based InDenverTimes.

Moreover, the absence of Fort Collins Now will primarily deprive the region of a dynamic agency of local investigative reporting. This may prove to be an even harder gap to fill, as it is a question of journalistic intent and style rather than just a choice of medium.

Elsewhere in the US, however, hope remains for investigative journalism. This is indicated by the success of the VoiceOfSanDeigo.org, an online, non-profit publication dedicated to in depth analysis and investigative reporting, which could serve as a model for other communities seeking to redevelop their local press.

Source: Editor&Publisher