For the love of The Post

Gosh, darn it, people like us. That “us” is The Cincinnati Post and The Kentucky Post, both with time clocks apparently ticking on an impending closure set for late this year (Scripps, the Post’s owner, has not officially said what will happen, however). Now two local newspapers (first CityBeat, then the Business Courier) have jumped into the fray about The Post’s final year.

CityBeat ran a very impressive cover story package – huge, even – on the whole story behind the reasons why Cincinnati is facing, for the first time in quite possibly two centuries, having one daily newspaper voice. And, more importantly, why that matters. Be sure to read the first story linked here, and check all the others on CityBeat’s page, linked on the right side. Great job – superb, in fact – to the reporters and editors who worked on these stories. And thank you!

Then, out of the blue, the Business Courier chimed in with an editorial calling for Scripps to save The Post in a new form (the link is for subscribers only and only shows a snippet). That paper’s publisher, Doug Bolton, actually was a kick-butt reporter back in the days at the paper (I hear he was a breaking-news machine), so probably no wonder why the Business Courier‘s views are what they are. Regardless, I think this goes to show how strongly people feel about having The Post stick around.

There also has been chatter for months about a group of local business people buying the paper, as I discussed in an earlier post.

I think all this talk is remarkable and while it fills me with some hope, I think the writing may be on the wall: We’re all out a newspaper, much less a job, sometime most likely in December.

I have been at The Post just a few days shy of a year now. And though I don’t carry all the baggage of the past few years, like watching the newsroom diminish into just a bare bones staff, reading CityBeat’s stories made me well up a bit. How could someone that loves good journalism as much as I do not feel a tremendous sadness looking at this situation?

Have to say, too, that no matter how small the staff gets, the paper still manages to kick some ass. I’ve said it before and I’ll keep saying it: Do not pass on The Post. You’re going to miss something. Plus, we’re not done yet. I look forward to being there and riding into the sunset with this paper and the many great journalists who are left and are ready and willing to go out, as one editor put it, with flags flying high. I think you’ll be surprised.