By Joe Morey Free Press Editor/Publisher A new report from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism puts a number on a troubling trend: 170 newspapers closed or merged across the country in the past year. That’s more than three a week, up from 136 the year before. The 2026 State of Local News report also found that 26 more counties became news deserts, bringing the total to 238. A news desert is a county without a locally based professional news source. Barron Co

Today, we have more information available at our fingertips than at any other time in human history. Yet strangely enough, I believe it has become harder in many communities to find out what's happening right down the road.