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GateHouse Media, the company that owns the New Bern Sun Journal, is closing the pressroom where the Sun Journal is printed and shifting printing to Fayetteville. According to Mike McHugh, a Jacksonville Daily News reporter who resigned on Tuesday in protest of the cuts, closing the pressroom as well as a call center based in Jacksonville will cost 40 people their jobs. There was no response to an email requesting more information and comment from Mike Distelhorst, the GateHouse regional publisher in charge of newspapers in Jacksonville, New Bern, Kinston, and Wilmington. The newspaper industry has been struggling for years due to increased competition onlineRead More →

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American Prospect, a non-profit website specializing in non-profit, independent journalism, has posted an article that is highly critical of GateHouse Media and explains much of what is going on at many of its properties, including the New Bern Sun Journal. The headline states: Saving the Free Press From Private Equity Navigating the digital transition is a huge challenge for newspapers. Absentee ownership by private equity predators makes it all but impossible.   It’s a long read, but it does a good job describing the toxic nature of private equity enterprises taking over local newspapers and running them into the ground. Here’s one example cited in the articleRead More →

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Alderman Sabrina Bengel takes the oath of office after being selected mayor pro tem. Alderman and former mayor pro tem Jeff Odham is in the background fuming. The two sit on opposite sides of the dais and, judging from their first meeting Tuesday, are on opposite sides of other things, too. It didn’t take long for four years of bad blood between Sabrina Bengel and Dana Outlaw/Jeff Odham to spill over into Tuesday’s Board of Aldermen meeting. The question is, who started it? • Was it Ward 1 Alderman Bengel who, during her first meeting as alderman (this time around) and using a portion ofRead More →

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You should know that the original version of this article has been taken down following a cease and desist demand from GateHouse Media. I was the executive editor at the Sun Journal until October 2017, when I resigned for personal and professional reasons. Once I discovered that at least one Sun Journal telemarketer was misrepresenting the circumstances of my departure from the company, I posted my resignation letter along with a memo  I wrote just prior to my resignation. A short time later, GateHouse Media sent me a cease and desist demand, which I present here in its entirety: December 14, 2017 Mr. Randy FosterRead More →

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It’s been about a month since I launched my local news site, https://www.newbernpost.com, as a hobby and as a personal mission to keep a journalistic watch over local government since that responsibility has been shirked by the local corporate-owned news media, including the Sun Journal, where I was executive editor until last month. I don’t post every day … early on, I posted once or twice a week. This week, it looks like I will be posting most days. But this is a hobby, a spare time thing, and I have a day job and other responsibilities. Over the last two weeks of October, startingRead More →

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Coming up Tuesday in the New Bern Post: Full coverage of the last Parking Advisory Committee meeting Tuesday afternoon and its final recommendations to the Board of Aldermen, and top-story coverage of Tuesday evening’s Board of Aldermen meeting. Later this week, I’ll drill down into the minutiae. Because I’m not looking to build an audience. I’m looking to build community awareness and civic involvement. ~ Randy Foster, New Bern Post Got tips or comments?Read More →

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The Sun Journal has a new advertising director, but you probably wouldn’t know that from reading the Sun Journal’s own article, here. (Note: The Sun Journal updated the linked article to make it more locally relevant.) The Sun Journal has a new executive editor, but you probably wouldn’t know from the Sun Journal’s own article, here, that his position is interim or why he is replacing me at the job. Newspapers pride themselves in covering local news, but when it comes to covering themselves, it’s hit and miss. Part of it is that journalists don’t like to write about themselves, even if the news isRead More →