Traverse City Record-Eagle

Elk Rapids Township

January 22, 2009

Local paper closes after 30+ years

By BILL O'BRIEN

ELK RAPIDS -- A weekly newspaper that's covered the Elk Rapids community since the mid-1970s published its last edition.

The Town Meeting in Elk Rapids, published by Up North Publications Inc. and owned by Journal Register Co., is closing its doors and is among several JRC publications around the country shuttered in recent months.

The shutdown was disclosed to readers in a two-sentence advertisement that appeared on page 2 of Thursday's final edition:

"Today marks the final issue of the Town Meeting. We appreciate your loyalty over the 30-plus years the Town Meeting has served your community."

Up North publisher Al Frattura declined comment Thursday on the newspaper's closing. He also declined comment on whether other JRC publications in northern Michigan will be affected. Its other area products include the Grand Traverse Insider, the Leader and Kalkaskian, the Antrim County News, the Petoskey/Charlevoix Star and other shoppers.

Several calls to JRC headquarters in Yardley, Penn., were not returned.

Members of the Antrim County community said the newspaper will be missed.

"It's been an important source of news for our community," said long-time reader Greg Reisig, of Elk Rapids. "For a long time, it was our only source of news in Elk Rapids."

The closure leaves the Elk Rapids News as the town's remaining newspaper. It's a free weekly publication distributed to around 7,000 homes and businesses in the area.

"It was good to have two newspapers," said Sheila Marker, office administrator for the Elk Rapids Chamber of Commerce. "What one didn't cover, the other did."

Like several newspaper and media companies, JRC is struggling with shrinking advertising revenues and rising expense costs, including higher prices for newsprint. The company posted a third quarter loss of $8.7 million in 2008, when it cut more than 8 percent of its workforce. It closed more than a dozen weekly publications on the East Coast last fall, and two more weeklies closed this month in Connecticut, the Hartford Courant reported Thursday.

The company owns 22 daily newspapers and around 300 other publications in Michigan, Ohio, New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

The Town Meeting started publication in June 1975. Its weekly circulation totaled more than 2,100, according to the company's Web site. The paper's business office at 204 River St. in Elk Rapids will shut today at 5 p.m.

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