The big take-away from the 166th annual convention of the NY Press Association is that weekly and monthly print newspapers are far from dead.
Kevin Slimp, a newspaper consultant and technology trainer, gave that message at his two-day seminar sessions. Slimp travels the country advising newspapers and through both polling and hands-on observation has seen the upturn.
“Readers love a well-rounded newspaper they can hold in their hands, chock full of interesting, well written local news,” he said.
It is widely reported that newspapers are dying. But that seems to be largely true only for small daily newspapers that are being bought up by large chains, many with a political agenda. Independent weeklies are doing just fine.
The convention centered around the NYS Better Newspaper Contest. These are the Oscars for the community newspaper arena – entered by most of the 800+ newspapers that make up the Association. The Red Hook Star-Revue, an independent newspaper published in Brooklyn captured more awards than any other Brooklyn publication.
The Brooklyn Paper, which covers news in downtown Brooklyn, was the winner of one award, a second-place citation for their coverage of the environment. The Bay News and Brooklyn Graphic, published by the same newspaper chain that publishes the Brooklyn Paper, won one award – First Place for Best News or Feature series.
The Red Hook Star-Revue took three awards. The first was a second-place award for Best Spot News Coverage. This was a story by reporter Brett Yates on the memorial for William Robertson last fall. Along with photographer Micah Rubin, Yates followed along the impromptu parade of the places in Red Hook Robertson loved. “Nice treatment of this very local story,” is what one of the judges said.
The second award for the Star-Revue was in the category Best Feature Story. Noah Phillips took second place for his story about Tony, longtime operator of Van Brunt’s Red Hook Luncheonette that appeared in the August 2018 issue. “Good story thoughtfully told,” said a judge.
The final award captured by the Star-Revue this year was in the category “Innovative Ad Project.” This was for our online media kit that appears on our web page. This kit includes spoken testimonials to the effectiveness of advertising in the paper. “Love the video on the home page. Layout is very nice and informative. Good videos and information.”
The Star-Revue was founded by George Fiala in June 2010. It has been recognized in 2016 and 2017 as one of the best community newspapers in New York City by the Center for Community and Ethnic Media, part of the CUNY School of Journalism. It has won awards in the Better Newspaper Contest for the past seven years.
Consistent with the trend noticed by Slimp, the Star-Revue has shown major growth in 2019, adding writers and pages as it expands its coverage throughout the borough.
“The death of the Village Voice was a huge loss for the city. We are not oblivious to it,” says Star-Revue publisher George Fiala.
