Four Kentucky newspapers stopped printing as 2023 began. How many are left?

In the past two weeks, three Kentucky newspapers have closed and one has announced a switch to online-only publication.

The Citizen Voice & Times, Clay City Times and Radcliff Sentinel have all closed, the Kentucky Press Association announced in a Jan. 4 Facebook post. The Citizen Voice & Times and Clay City Times each published their last issues Dec. 29 and their owner, Teresa Hatfield-Barger, has retired.

In addition to Hatfield-Barger, there were three employees plus a delivery person at the Citizen Voice & Times and Clay City Times, according to a previous Herald-Leader report.

The Sentinel, based in Hardin County, was 75 years and six days old, the KPA post said. Its final issue had no ads and focused on the paper’s history.

Another, The Todd County Standard, will be online-only.

“Unlike Clay City and the Todd County newspapers, it was not the only paper in the county so that’s not a ’news desert’ area,” KPA Executive Director David Thompson wrote in an email to Herald-Leader, speaking about the Sentinel.

The Sentinel was owned by the Royalty family, who began operations in December 1948. It was not immediately clear how many job losses would result from the Sentinel’s closure.

“It’s sad, it’s disheartening because our newspapers have survived floods, tornadoes, fires, all kinds of disasters,” Thompson said. “But COVID, the downturn of advertising because local businesses have been closing, readers changing from the print publication to online (eeditions of newspapers, Facebook pages of newspapers other online sources that could be more misinformation than information) have had a great effect on this industry.”

About 150 newspapers remain in the Bluegrass State, Thompson continued, and he said he hopes they will weather the storm and survive.

Shift away from print news

The Todd County Standard has announced a shift to an online-only platform.

“With rising printing costs, declining subscriptions after the pandemic, and declining local advertising we felt it was time. We will be putting out a weekly newsletter by email in a couple of weeks and will have a heavy emphasis on social media,” a Jan. 4 Todd County Standard Facebook post to readers said.

The Todd County Standard will restore its website in the coming weeks, the announcement said.

“We feel that a lot of people are getting their news from social media on their cell phones, which can be dangerous,” student media adviser for the University of Kentucky and owner and publisher of the Todd County Standard Ryan Craig said. “It is our hope to help direct them to local reporting from there.”

Loss of local reporting

Craig said in an email to the Herald-Leader he is concerned the closures of local newspapers may lead to an increase in the number of news deserts.

“If the closures continue in places that can’t go to digital or there isn’t a way for another media outlet to replace what was there, we may be looking at swaths of Kentucky (and other places) where news deserts will be. We already have some news deserts, but my concern (is) that more are on the way,” Craig said.

Decreased access to accurate information from local outlets may make people more likely to believe misinformation from unreliable sources on social media, Craig continued.

“I have spent the majority of my professional career covering rural areas who needed to have a good, strong voice to let them know what was going on in their communities,” Craig said. “My real worry is that without a good watchdog that lives and works in the community they serve you may be looking at an ill-informed citizenship that doesn’t have a say in important things like taxes, schools and how the government should serve them. It is very concerning, especially in places where the only media that did those kind of stories was the local newspaper that is closing or could close any day.”

The closures of longtime print newspapers is not surprising, Craig said, because the cost of printing and mailing has increased in recent years, while subscriptions and advertising revenue has largely declined.

One possible explanation Craig gave for a decline in interest in print news is greater access to dependable cellular and broadband connections, allowing residents of rural areas to get their news online.

Craig wrote for Nieman Reports in September 2019 cautioning of what may happen when weekly newspapers disappear. Local reporting often provides indispensable information about zoning, city council and school board meetings, Craig wrote, and social media does not provide an adequate substitute.

“Reporters are no longer able to cover everything and everywhere that matters, because they aren’t there, victims of corporate cuts, dividends, and the bottom line,” Craig wrote in the Nieman Reports story.

While he used to be more optimistic about the future of local weekly newspapers, Craig said he now expects a vacuum in rural areas sooner rather than later.

“...It is very concerning that small newspapers who have traditionally done a fine job of covering their community are gone. I’m worried about how that will be replaced either in print or online. My hope is there is someone or some media in those communities who can find a way to give the community at least some of the coverage that will be missing with the closure of the local newspaper,” Craig said.

Thompson also said he hopes to see coverage voids filled.

“Perhaps someone will come into those communities and start a newspaper,” Thompson said. “An energetic young couple might just find a long-time satisfying career doing that.”

Do you have a question about media in Kentucky for our service journalism team? We’d like to hear from you. Fill out our Know Your Kentucky form or email ask@herald-leader.com.

‘It’s really sad.’ Two Kentucky newspapers closing, leaving one county with no paper