Inside LINK is a weekly column from our CEO, Lacy Starling. If you have questions you’d like Lacy to answer, email her at lacy@linknky.com.
Sometimes, there are announcements I get to make as CEO of LINK that are so exciting, I can’t even bring myself to write a long preamble in this column. Usually, I can bring myself to set things up with a long-winded explanation of what’s coming, but today is not that day. I’m fit to burst and cannot wait any longer to tell everyone this:
We’re starting a weekly newspaper.
Whew. That feels better.
(Now, those of you who receive our Daily LINK email newsletter already knew that, but for everyone else, this is news.)
Starting Nov. 18, everyone in Northern Kentucky is going to have the opportunity to subscribe to a robust, information-packed, county-specific weekly newspaper.
We’re taking our bi-monthly format and expanding it — producing in-depth stories, news briefs, sports, arts, and a crossword puzzle and sudoku — every single week. We’re even bringing back the Kentucky Post’s beloved Town Crier.
You may be asking why, in the year of our Lord 2022, we would make a pivot to a more-frequent print product. But the answer is simple.
Northern Kentucky deserves it.
Back in May, the Gannett company (owners of the Cincinnati Enquirer and USA Today, among other papers) decided to shut down the Recorder papers, eliminating the last vestige of a true Northern Kentucky print newspaper. (I think we can all agree that the “Kentucky” Enquirer is not that.)
Part of a nationwide cost-cutting move, Gannett shut down those papers, which had served the NKY Metro for decades, because they could no longer staff them, or spend money printing them. That’s despite the fact that they were receiving huge amounts of mandatory advertising revenue from the municipalities and public organizations required by Kentucky statute to advertise every week.
Gannett may have shut down those papers and eliminated their expenses, but they didn’t give up the revenue. Our NKY Metro is sending hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in mandatory advertising spend off to Gannett corporate — and none of that is being invested back into the Northern Kentucky community.
There are 405,000 people in NKY, and growing. Boone County is the fastest-growing part of the Cincinnati Metro. We have 36 cities in three counties, 17 school districts, nearly two dozen police departments, hundreds of companies employing thousands of people. And Northern Kentucky doesn’t have a regular, weekly print paper that covers the news, sports, arts, and entertainment that happen on this side of the river.
That’s flat wrong, and we’re going to fix it.
LINK exists to bring the people of NKY the news of NKY in whatever form that takes – our paywall-free digital site, our audio products, our live election forums, and now, our weekly newspaper. No matter how you get your news, we’re going to figure out a way to get it to you.
Because we want everyone to have a chance to get this weekly paper, we’re making it very affordable (Kentucky statute requires paid subscriptions, so we can’t just give it away every week). A subscription costs just $25 for the first year, and $50 a year after that. People can also give gift subscriptions for the same price, if you know someone who would love to get the paper every week.
NKY deserves to have its story told, in all forms. The LINK Reader will be the weekly paper that tells that story.
