By Sean P. Ray | Managing Editor

Are you a frequent reader of The Northside Chronicle? Do you want to support the future of the paper for years to come? And are you interested in the chance of winning a $100 gift card?

If you answered “yes” to any of the above, you’ll be happy to know The Northside Chronicle is launching a subscription drive for the next few months, aiming to grow our subscriber base and ensure stability for the paper moving forward.

An anonymous donor has graciously agreed to provide a match for every new or renewed subscription for the length of the drive. That means your financial contribution will be doubled, making now the best time to support The Northside Chronicle.

What’s more, all new or renewed subscribers during the drive period will have their names entered into a drawing for a $100 gift card to a Northside restaurant (exact restaurant still to be determined). If you’re the winner, not only will you greatly support The Chronicle, but you’ll make a net profit with the gift card.

Above all, however, a subscription to The Chronicle is the strongest sign of support you can give us. We’re proud of the fact that we’re able to provide the vast majority of our newspapers for free, serving as a community resource for the entire Northside neighborhood.

While we do receive support from advertisers, the cost of providing the news is not getting any cheaper. Subscriptions provide us with a steady flow of funds we can rely on in case we see a drop in advertisements in any given month.

Despite having a subscription program for a long time, The Chronicle does not actually have that many subscribers. Of the 4,000 papers we print monthly, less than 2% go to a subscriber. In other words, while we print four digits’ worth of newspapers, only a double digit amount of them is covered by a subscriber.

Your subscription is so much more than getting the paper delivered to your door every month. It’s a sign that you support The Chronicle and, by proxy, the Northside community as a whole.

We currently do not know how long the subscription drive will last, but we encourage our readers to subscribe as soon as possible while matching funds are still available. To subscribe, either fill out the form on page two and mail it to us with a check, or subscribe on our website, thenorthsidechronicle.com.

If you can’t subscribe, that’s OK. We also have a donate option available on our website if you want to support us through a smaller amount, or if you want to show your support beyond a subscription. We appreciate all the help we can get either way.

We’ll be back each month for the length of the drive to bring updates. In addition, we’re launching a series to accompany the drive updates, taking a look at the news industry on multiple levels, starting right here in the City of Pittsburgh. Enjoy this deep dive into the world of Pittsburgh news, and I’ll be back next month to let you know how the drive is going and any updates we receive.

The State of News: Pittsburgh

If you ask Andrew Conte, director of the Center for Media Innovation at Point Park University, how he views the news industry in Pittsburgh, he begins with the negatives.

“It’s a challenging time for local news just because there’s been so much disruption and I think there’s a mixed response to that,” Conte told The Chronicle. “A lot of news outlets have struggled or closed, and a lot of journalists have gone into other industries.”

Just recently, one Pittsburgh publication closed its doors: The Gazette 2.0, which covered the McKees Rocks area, shuttered its doors in October, though publisher Sonja Reis has announced she’s working on some form of continuation for the publication.

In addition, Pittsburgh Community Television (PCTV) announced on July 23 that it would close at the end of August, citing a “decline in cable subscribers and the changing media landscape.”

At the same time, however, Conte sees positives. With the growth of technology, there’s more chances for local people to get involved in news, and anyone with a smartphone or laptop can create a good story, video or audio piece.

In addition, he said a lot of the hurt has been felt by larger metropolitan newspapers, while “hyper-local” newspapers are finding themselves increasing in importance.

In the day and age of Facebook, X (formerly Twitter) and other social media sites, Conte sees hyper-local news sources as still being an important way for people to learn about what’s going on in the community around them.

What’s been a challenge is getting people to support their local news source in a time when just about everything can be found on the Internet.

“We’ve gotten this idea that somehow news is free,” Conte said. “If you want good, reliable news, you should support it.”

Conte is familiar with what happens to a community when it loses its local news source. He did his doctoral dissertation on the topic and recently released a book, “Death of the Daily News” examining the subject, specifically looking at the community of McKeesport.

While Facebook groups or other digital platforms might step in when a newspaper dies, Conte said professional journalism helps to sort out irrelevant, inaccurate or biased information.

“If you want to know what’s on the Northside, you’ve got to look at The Northside Chronicle,” he said.

Frank Garland, coordinator of the Pittsburgh Media Partnership — a coalition of Pittsburgh media outlets, of which The Chronicle is a member — said another interesting trend in local news has been an increasing specialization for outlets. He specifically pointed to On Stage Pittsburgh, a news site which — as its name implies — reports exclusively on developments within the Pittsburgh live theater scene.

“They saw a need for coverage on that realm, and they seem to do a great job,” Garland said.

This specialization is not just in regards to subject matter, but to coverage area. While larger newspapers or news sources may struggle, those focusing on smaller neighborhoods can find opportunity.

However, when these smaller news sources die off, it can lead to a major loss of reliable information. Garland specifically brought up the Gazette 2.0’s closure.

“There’s a feeling over there that they’re missing something,” he said. “Because they realize the bigger publications aren’t going to cover the Stowe Township Supervisors meeting or the Montour School District Board meeting.”

One hyper-local newspaper which has seen success is Print, which covers the East End neighborhoods. Co-founded in December 2015 by Ann Belser and Brian Hyslop, the latter of whom has since left the publication, Print follows a different model than most modern newspapers: barely having an online presence.

While Print does have a website, it offers only short previews of the content in its newspaper. To properly read a Print story, one needs to either be a subscriber or to buy a copy of the paper.

“Levin Furniture doesn’t offer to you that you can either buy a sofa or have the same sofa for free,” Belser said. “But that’s what newspapers did. They are giving away their product, the one thing that they had.”

While this approach may seem unorthodox, it appears to be working. Belser said she can recall a fellow journalist in the early 2000s, just as the Internet was getting started, saying “someone smart will figure out how to make money off of this.” By contrast, Belser said Print, with its minimal digital presence, is “one of the few profitable newspapers in the country.”

At a local level, Belser believes the biggest issue facing the Pittsburgh news scene is an increasing lack of news gatherers. As more newspapers close or limit operations, there are fewer and fewer outlets covering the same topics.

Having multiple reporters covering the same thing helps to keep “everybody honest,” Belser said.

“The Fourth Estate is not just to keep everybody else honest,” she said. “It’s to keep itself honest.”