Last week the California Newspaper Publishers Association held its 2014 Press Summit. With sessions entitled “Native Advertising: Savior or Sinner?” “Digital Agencies: Myth, Realities and Growth,” “Managing and Monetizing Your Digital Game,” and “Tracking a Changing (and Mobile) Audience,” the summit was an opportunity to educate and inform California’s newspaper industry on current trends, best practices, and the evolution of the news ecosystem.
It was also an opportunity to celebrate the best work in the industry in the past year through the Better Newspaper Awards. The California Newspaper Publishers Association, established in 1888, currently has almost 900 members, which includes all the state’s daily newspapers, the majority of community and weekly publications, campus newspapers, as well as a variety of allied members. This year 160 publications submitted entries for awards ranging from general excellence to best writing, photography, and graphics. The VOICE was awarded second place for Best Front Page and Best Column and honorable mentions for General Excellence, Best Artistic Photo, and Best Local Reporting for our series on the Inland Empire’s Recall Initiatives.
I am proud of the small but dedicated staff that I work with every week to deliver what we hope is an informed and thoughtful perspective on issues of importance to the residents of Inland Southern California. Lee Ragin, our editor and general manager, manages the creation of our content. Chris Allen, creative director, designs our print edition. Benoit and Kathy Malphettes are our amazing portrait photographers. Corey Arvin writes many of our feature stories and is editor of our website blackvoicenews.com. Andre Loftis, our newest staff member, is refining our brand, manages our social media, and designs our digital edition. Natasha Ferguson works on our special events. And Susan Morris manages the front office and generally keeps us all out of trouble.
Our democracy can only be as good as our citizens and newspapers continue to deliver content to educate and inform all communities. As we discussed at the summit, the method of delivery may have changed from print only to a myriad of digital and mobile options, but the role of the newspaper in a democratic society remains unchanged, a free press is essential to a strong democracy.
Newspapers, while navigating market challenges as an industry, remain a vital force in local communities throughout the country. We are not going anywhere. There are close to 1000 newspapers currently circulating in the state of California ranging in size, frequency, and content from large metro dailies to small weeklies. At the Better Newspaper Awards ceremony award-winning television writer and attorney Jonathan Shapiro speaking directly to the publishers in the room, used words spoken by Joseph Pulitzer over a century ago to remind us of our importance and our historic duty as the fourth estate, “put it before them briefly so they will read it, clearly so they will appreciate it, picturesquely so they will remember it, and above all, accurately so they will be guided by its light.”