Hoosier State Press Association - The Indiana Publisher
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/112290
The Indiana Publisher Published alternate Thursdays Volume 78, Issue 5 ��� February 28, 2013 Farewell, welcome to board members 2013 INDIANA GENERAL ASSEMBLY HSPA Foundation leadership changes S everal changes and re-appointments were made to the HSPA and HSPA Foundation boards of directors during the recent Annual Meetings and Government Conference in Linda Chandler Indianapolis. Four HSPA board members whose terms where scheduled to expire will continue on the board. They are: ��� John Haley of the Pulaski County Journal (Winamac) ��� Robyn McCloskey of the Pharos-Tribune (Logansport) and Kokomo Tribune, vice president of the board ��� Jon O���Bannon of The Corydon Democrat, secretary of the board ��� Tim Timmons of The Paper of Montgomery County��(Crawfordsville) and The Times (Noblesville). Linda Chandler decided to let her term expire on the Foundation board after serving since its inception in 2000. Neal Ronquist resigned from the Foundation board ahead of his move to a position with Community Newspaper Holdings Inc. in Traverse City, Mich. The Foundation board elected Michael J. Christman, president and CEO of Fort Wayne Newspapers and publisher of The News-Sentinel (Fort Wayne), and William ���B.J.��� Riley, CNHI senior vice president and Sun Belt regional manager and publisher of The Tribune Star (Terre Haute), to three-year terms. State lawmakers move forward bills opposed by HSPA Proposed legislation would end publication requirement for school districts T he bill containing a provision eliminating the publication of annual school district financial reports in local newspapers ��� replaced with school districts posting them on their websites ��� passed the Indiana House 66-30. H.B. 1427, authored by State Rep. Rhonda Rhoads, R-Corydon, has been touted as a bill containing provisions approved by the House last year, but the financial report section was not part of last year���s bill. The Hoosier State Press Association has not ascertained who added the provision this year. Rhoads��� justification is that fewer people read newspapers and that school district posting will be available to more people. Her logic doesn���t match facts, said Steve Key, executive director and general counsel for the Hoosier State Press Association. For example, the Crawfords�� ville school district averages 1,149 unique visitors to its website a month. The combined daily circulation of Crawfordsville���s com- peting newspapers (Journal Review and The Paper of Montgomery County) is 8,554. With the average newspaper being read by two individuals, Montgomery Rhonda Rhoads County citizens are nearly 15 times more likely to see the financial report in the newspaper than on the school district website. Cost also should be an issue when it comes to the financial report. A quick look at early responses to a request for the public notice cost compared to the school district budget shows taxpayers paid between $595.44 to $1,599.86 to learn how school budgets of $13.5 million to $131.7 million were spent. A survey showed that 73 percent of Hoosiers want notices published in newspapers, Key said. ���When specifically asked if government agencies��� use of tax dollars to publish public notices impacted their desire See Bills, Page 2 Submit rates to increase revenue Keep your paper in advertising buys H SPA and its advertising arm, Midwest Advertising Placements, need your help to remain competitive and increase placements in Indiana newspapers. The HSPA board of directors requests that newspapers approve a negotiating window for MAP staff to operate within. This will allow staff to successfully quote ad buys in a timely manner. It gives HSPA the flexibility through MAP to negotiate on newspapers��� behalf in our efforts to win new business for state newspapers. Please send your 2013 ad rates via the form newspapers previously received, or visit www.hspa. com/2013rates to download a form. Check the box marked ���YES, we want to participate in the negotiating window program��� at the bottom of the form to be sure your newspaper is included in quotes. Complete the form and return it to advertising coordinator Shawn Goldsby by email at sgoldsby@hspa.com or fax at (317) 624-4428. Please return this form as soon as possible to provide the information needed for HSPA and MAP to update databases and rate sheets. For additional questions, please contact Goldsby at (317) 803-4772 or MAP advertising Director Pamela Lego at (812) 350-7711. Saturday mail loss would sting worst in small towns By Tonda Rush National Newspaper Association W hy do small town newspapers publish on Saturdays? The Saturday paper isn���t only for football as it is in many Texas towns, said Mary Judson, publisher of the Port Arkansas South Jetty in Texas. It provides coupons for store sales, announcements for Sunday church events and breaking news stories of small towns. But it was sports that led the Times-Leader, a 6,900circulation twice-weekly in the southwestern Kentucky town of Princeton, to start its Saturday paper. Princeton is nestled in the flat farmlands of the state; a community steeped in history, having a downtown where there are few vacant buildings, with Interstate 69 and Interstate 24 running through the area. It is home to the University of Kentucky Research and Education Center, a hotbed for agriculture research through the state���s land-grant university. Until 1992, two weeklies competed head to head. When they merged, a Saturday paper was created and the weekly became a twice weekly, publishing Wednesdays and Saturdays. It is mailed through seven post offices in five counties. The publisher trucks bundles of newspapers to those post offices between the Friday night printing and Saturday���s dawn to get into mailboxes. For Princeton, like most towns, the mailed newspaper has no substitute. ���Although there are four dailies with circulation in the area, none has more than a few hundred readers in Princeton,��� according to Publisher John S. (Chip) Hutcheson III. ���The TimesLeader circulates 5,400 papers each issue in Princeton, providing strong coverage of local government, schools, church- es, civic clubs and police activity. Churches often use the Saturday paper to promote activities on Sunday. In this rural community, it is viewed as a major community-builder. It has a locally written opinion page both Wednesday and Saturday. Each issue of the paper ranges from a minimum of 24 pages to 36 pages. With a struggling radio station (in town), the newspaper is the only comprehensive news agent for the community.��� It will be newspapers like the Times-Leader and the South Jetty that will be most hurt by the U.S. Postal Service���s announcement that it wants to end Saturday mail delivery. Although Congress has not yet agreed with that decision, the Postal Service wants to provide the opportunity for some industries to mail on Saturdays but not others. Newspapers would either have to find a new way to reach readers or change to a different delivery day. But for a newspaper like the Times-Leader, picking a different day isn���t easy. A Friday paper would miss the sports scores from Fridaynight games. Mondays would miss the church news and the sales. And killing that See Mail, Page 4