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By Dan Kennedy • The press, politics, technology, culture and other passions

Tag: Lisa DeSisto

Why concerns about the Portland Press Herald’s funding are overblown

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On October 2, 2023

In Local News

Photo (cc) 2018 by Molladams

Recently Max Tani of Semafor and Richard J. Tofel, who writes the newsletter Second Rough Draft, have raised questions about whether the folks involved in the purchase of the Portland Press Herald and its affiliated Maine papers from the retiring publisher, Reade Brower, have been sufficiently transparent in disclosing who the funders are.

The papers were bought during the summer by the National Trust for Local News, a nonprofit that has been involved in several acquisitions aimed at preventing legacy newspapers from falling into the hands of corporate chain ownership. In Maine, Tani and Tofel argue, the billionaire George Soros may have been more deeply involved than was previously known, while the involvement of another billionaire who was reportedly part of the purchase, Hansjörg Wyss, hasn’t been disclosed at all.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that this is essentially a non-issue. Tofel himself notes that the previous management of the papers remains in place and that “invocations of Soros as a sort of bogeyman have long since become a principal way to dog whistle anti-Semitism; it ranks right up there with ‘globalist’ in this rhetoric.”

More to the point, the Press Herald itself followed up on Tani’s reporting, and it sounds like the full story behind the purchase will be revealed soon. (I was interviewed for the piece, written by reporter Rachel Ohm.) Longtime Press Herald publisher Lisa DeSisto, now the CEO and publisher of the Maine Trust for Local News, the nonprofit that has been set up to own the papers, is quoted as saying, “We want to make more of a splash and have a more comprehensive introduction to the Maine Trust rather than just [putting things out in] pieces. We’re really waiting to announce a broader vision.”

Added Will Nelligan, who’s the Maine project lead for the National Trust: “We will announce that coalition of Maine funders when we announce the Maine Trust.”

No, the announcement didn’t come in September, as had been originally promised. But is that really a big deal as long as disclosure is on its way? The papers themselves, by the way, remain for-profit entities, so it seems unlikely that either the National Trust or the Maine Trust will be looking for ongoing support to prop them up.

If you take a look at the National Trust’s funders, you’ll see that, in addition to Soros’ Open Society Foundations, they include a number of respected journalism funders, including the Knight Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the Democracy Fund and the Lenfest Institute, which owns The Philadelphia Inquirer. The Gates Family Foundation, by the way, is a Colorado-based philanthropy that has nothing to do with Bill or Melinda Gates.

When I asked University of Maine journalism professor Michael Socolow to weigh in, he emailed me comments he had previously posted on X/Twitter, noting that Tani and Tofel had emphasized Soros’ and Wyss’ liberal politics but adding they had been unable to back up whether that was relevant. (To be fair, Tofel seemed less impressed with that angle than Tani.) Socolow said:

I’m not sure there’s a story here. Neither Tani nor Tofel specify the ways the new ownership has altered editorial content. They’re seemingly insinuating that the new ownership purchased the newspapers to shape news content for partisan political reasons. But how much disclosure and transparency about Reade Brower and his business interests did these publications publish before the sale? It’s not clear to me why there needs to be a new, and apparently higher, standard simply because the ownership is now non-profit versus commercial. If evidence emerges that the sort of meddling Tani and Tofel insinuate begins occurring, then I agree we have an important story. But we’re not there yet.

Let me end with a couple of disclosures: Ellen Clegg and I interviewed National Trust co-founder and CEO Elizabeth Hansen Shapiro on our podcast, “What Works: The Future of Local News,” and we wrote about the National Trust’s successful effort to save two dozen community newspapers in the Denver suburbs in our forthcoming book, “What Works in Community News.” I worked with DeSisto at The Boston Phoenix and Ellen later got to know her at The Boston Globe, and we both consider her to be a first-rate, ethical news executive.

The purchase of the Press Herald papers by the National Trust was unalloyed good news, and it sounds like the questions that Tani and Tofel have raised will be answered soon.

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The Portland Press Herald and its 21 other papers are sold to a national nonprofit

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On July 10, 2023

In Local News

Portland Press Herald mailbox

Photo (cc) 2022 by Jules Verne Times Two

The news about the news doesn’t get much better than this: The National Trust for Local News will acquire Maine’s Portland Press Herald and its affiliated four daily newspapers and 17 weeklies. The deal was announced earlier today. Although not all details of the sale are known, early indications are that the papers will remain for-profit entities under nonprofit ownership. The papers, known collectively as Masthead Maine, will continue to be managed by chief executive officer Lisa DeSisto.

According to Rachel Ohm of the Press Herald, the National Trust emerged as the buyer after the recently formed Maine Journalism Foundation, or MaineJF, fell short in its efforts to raise enough money to buy the papers on its own. MaineJF, also a nonprofit, then started working with the National Trust. Elizabeth Hansen Shapiro, the co-founder and CEO of the National Trust, told the Press Herald that the two organizations are continuing to work together, although it was unclear what ongoing role the foundation might have. The foundation, by the way, would have reorganized the papers as nonprofits; based on Ohm’s story, it sounds like that’s no longer on the table.

The papers were purchased in 2018 by Reade Brower, a printer who acquired them from billionaire owner Donald Sussman. Brower built a reputation as a solid steward who nevertheless was not averse to making cuts in order to stave off losses. Hansen Shapiro would not disclose what the National Trust paid, but it’s likely that Brower could have gotten more from a corporate chain looking to swoop in, gut newsrooms and squeeze out revenues. If that’s the case, then Brower deserves credit for putting his legacy above making every possible dollar.

The independently owned Bangor Daily News remains the only daily in the state that isn’t part of Masthead Maine.

The governance structure of the new ownership has yet to be announced, and maybe even the principals don’t quite know what it will look like yet. The National Trust is best known for rescuing a group of weekly and monthly papers in suburban Denver back in 2021, and now owns them in conjunction with The Colorado Sun, a well-regarded for-profit digital startup.

Earlier:

The Globe will partner with the Portland Press Herald on a Spotlight reporting project

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On February 9, 2021

In Media

The Boston Globe will partner with the Portland Press Herald on an unspecified investigative reporting project, according to the trade publication Editor & Publisher. The partnership will produce “a multi-part investigative report that will be published by both organizations this fall.”

The project will be funded by the Spotlight Investigative Journalism Fellowship, established by the Globe and Participant Media, the producers of the movie “Spotlight.” Grants of up to $100,000 are awarded to reporters or teams of reporters. This is the first time the Globe has partnered with another news organization. The series will be published by both papers.

Scott Allen, the Globe’s assistant managing editor for projects, declined in an email to say what the topic of the reporting would be — but when I noted that the Press Herald reporter who’ll be working on the project, Penelope Overton, covers the lobster industry, Allen said that “we expect to take full advantage of her considerable expertise.”

There are some interesting intersections between the Globe and the Press Herald. The E&P story points out that Press Herald managing editor Steve Greenlee worked at the Globe for 12 years. But it goes beyond that. Lisa DeSisto, who is chief executive officer of the Press Herald and its sister papers, was previously a high-ranking business-side executive at the Globe (and, before that, a colleague of mine at The Boston Phoenix).

The two papers also have the distinction of having been pursued by Boston-area businessman Aaron Kushner, who tried to buy the Globe in 2010 and nearly succeeded in buying the Press Herald in 2012. Kushner and a team of investors ended up purchasing the Orange County Register in Southern California later in 2012. They spent considerable resources in building up the Register and acquiring and launching other papers — only to tear it all down in short order when the hoped-for revenues failed to materialize. Today the Register is owned by the notorious hedge fund Alden Global Capital. (I tell the story of Kushner’s newspaper adventures in my book “The Return of the Moguls.”)

Today the Press Herald is owned by Reade Brower, a printer, who’s built a small chain of Maine newspapers and gets generally high marks for his stewardship. The Globe, of course, is owned by billionaires John and Linda Henry.

Making sense of the Portland Press Herald’s elimination of its Monday print edition

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On January 6, 2020

In Media

Those of us who have followed the transition of newspapers from print to free digital and, now, to paid digital have long predicted that seven-day print will eventually morph into one weekend print edition supplemented by digital the rest of the week.

Last week the Portland Press Herald announced it would take a step in that direction, eliminating its Monday print edition starting in March. Like many papers, the Press Herald has been emphasizing paid digital, so a cutback on print should be seen as an inevitable next step rather than the beginning of the end.

Still, I was curious about the decision to cut print on Monday. Among those of us who follow such things, the speculation usually involves eliminating the Saturday paper, or publishing the big Sunday paper on Saturday as an all-weekend edition. (The Sunday edition of the Press Herald is called the Maine Sunday Telegram.)

According to the Press Herald’s latest filing with the Alliance for Audited Media, the Saturday print edition is slightly larger than the Monday edition (25,450 to 25,358). The Saturday edition, though, gets an artificial boost — the Press Herald offers a four-day Thursday-through-Sunday print subscription as a cheaper alternative to seven-day (soon to be six-day) print. Paid Sunday print circulation is 40,091.

Still, anyone who’s paged through the Monday edition of a local daily newspaper knows that advertising on that day is virtually non-existent. So, for a variety of reasons, the Press Herald probably made the right choice.

Also, Kris Olson offers this:

The Press Herald isn’t the first daily paper to cut print days. It’s worth watching, though, because the owner, Reade Brower (who also owns most of the daily newspapers in Maine as well as a few weeklies), seems committed to coming up with a long-term strategy for economic sustainability. Press Herald publisher Lisa DeSisto tells her paper that the Monday move will enable the paper to avoid cutting staff.

Perhaps he might consider emulating the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, which last year eliminated print except on Sundays and gave its paid subscribers free iPads so they could continue to read the paper online.

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Here are three new reasons to be optimistic about local news

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On November 9, 2019

In Media

Note: Make that four reasons. See update below.

The crisis in local news won’t be solved all at once. Rather, it will be solved community by community as entrepreneurial-minded journalists seek to fill the gaps left behind by corporate-owned chain newspapers. Here are three new reasons to be optimistic.

In Maine, the Portland Phoenix, the last of the great Phoenix alternative weeklies, is scheduled to relaunch this coming Wednesday under new ownership after ceasing publication earlier this year. The free paper and website are part of New Portland Publishing Co., headed by Marian McCue and Karen Wood.

The relaunch was announced Oct. 22 by Marian McCue and Karen Wood, principals of New Portland Publishing Co. McCue will serve as the editor and Mo Mehlsak, most recently executive editor of The Forecaster, American Journal and Lakes Region Weekly newspapers, will be managing editor.

“While we always admired the energy of the Phoenix, and the strong entertainment coverage, our focus will be more on news and analysis, and in-depth investigative stories that explore the challenges facing this area,” McCue said in a press release announcing the new venture.

Added Wood: “We’ve had a very positive response from early conversations with advertisers and people in the community. We are convinced that a free distribution newspaper will be successful, and provide an effective forum for our advertisers.”

The new Portland Phoenix has a stiff challenge ahead of it in the form of the daily Portland Press Herald, the flagship of a Maine-based chain. The Press Herald is considerably more robust than papers owned by the national chains, and the publisher — Lisa DeSisto — is an alumnus of The Boston Phoenix who knows how to put out a paper oriented toward arts and entertainment. (Note: I worked with Lisa at the Phoenix for several years.)

Still, it’s fantastic news that someone is going to try to revive the Phoenix in Portland, which is the sort of smaller city that ought to be able to support an alt-weekly.

***

Bill Wasserman is one of Eastern Massachusetts’ legendary local newspaper owners. Founder of the Ipswich Chronicle, he built that into a chain of about a dozen North Shore papers and sold them in 1986. Those papers eventually were acquired by GateHouse Media, and Wasserman has been grousing about what happened to them ever since. Earlier this year, GateHouse got rid of the Ipswich Chronicle as a standalone title, merging it with two other papers.

In an interview for CommonWealth Magazine in 2008, Wasserman told me the main problem with corporate ownership was a failure to understand that, even in the best of times, community journalism is little more than a break-even proposition. “I was paid a salary, which was modest,” said Wasserman. “The reward was not in the profit. The reward was having a lot of fun putting out a community paper.”

Now Wasserman has gone back to the future, lending his expertise as a consultant and ad salesman to a start-up called Ipswich Local News — a free paper and website that is seeking nonprofit status. The editor and publisher is John Muldoon.

***

Jenn Lord Paluzzi holds the distinction of being laid off by two national chains — GateHouse (at The MetroWest Daily News) and MediaNews Group (at The Sun of Lowell). Now she’s launched a community news site in her hometown of Grafton called Grafton Common that is loaded with local news.

Some years back, Lord Paluzzi was involved in a startup called Greater Grafton. But that venture ended up getting sold to a chain of local websites that ended up going out of business. Best of luck to her as she goes off on her own once again.

Update: And a fourth — how could I forget the recently launched Provincetown Independent?

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Stephen King’s tweet saves local book reviews at the Maine Sunday Telegram

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On January 13, 2019

In Media

Stephen King is no longer singing the local-book-review blues. Photo (cc) 2013 by the USO.

This is a hoot. After the Portland Press Herald made it known that it would drop freelance-written reviews of local books as a cost-saving measure, Maine’s favorite author, Stephen King, lodged a protest on Twitter and urged his followers to do the same.

The Press Herald responded that if King could persuade at least 100 people to buy digital subscriptions, they would restore the reviews to the Sunday edition, known as the Maine Sunday Telegram:

It worked, and the book reviews will return next Sunday. “It’s a Stephen King story with a happy ending,” publisher Lisa DeSisto told The New York Times. (I worked with DeSisto at The Boston Phoenix many years ago, and she makes a cameo in “The Return of the Moguls.”)

Let me pour just a small amount of lukewarm water on all this. First, cutting local book reviews without consulting readers makes as little sense as, oh, slashing the Sunday funnies. Second, I hope this doesn’t become a habit. Hey, let’s tell everyone we’re going to stop covering restaurants unless we can sell 1,000 more subscriptions.

Still, this is a great story. I’m glad King’s influence did the trick.

Clarification: There was no public announcement that the Press Herald was planning to drop local reviews, but freelance contributors were made aware of it. I’ve rewritten the top to reflect that.

Monday update: Publishers Weekly has an especially detailed account of what went down. Also, King’s gambit did not save jobs elsewhere at the Press Herald:

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Lisa DeSisto leaves Globe, heads north

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On October 9, 2012

In Media

Lisa DeSisto

Big news coming out of the Boston Globe today: Lisa DeSisto, chief advertising officer of Boston Globe Media and general manager of Boston.com, is leaving to become chief executive officer of MaineToday Media and publisher of the Portland Press Herald.

I worked with Lisa at the Phoenix back in the 1990s, and I think I can safely say that the Globe will miss her. Just recently, Lisa came up with the idea of launching an online radio station at Boston.com, RadioBDC, featuring several folks who had been laid off when the Phoenix sold WFNX Radio. WFNX continues online as well, and is formally relaunching on Oct. 31.

Here’s the announcement from Globe publisher Christopher Mayer:

I’d like to update everyone on a change in the leadership of the Globe. After 17 years, Lisa DeSisto will be leaving the Globe to become chief executive officer of MaineToday Media and the publisher of the Portland Press Herald. Lisa’s contributions to the Globe and Boston.com have been enormous, and she will be missed.

Fortunately, she has a strong team in place. Jason Kissell, Jane Bowman, and Tom Cole will report to me. Jason Kissell, vice president for advertising, will take on all advertising sales responsibilities, including digital advertising operations. Jane Bowman, executive director of advertising, will retain her business development responsibilities and add oversight of marketing and RadioBDC. Tom Cole, executive director of business development, will continue in the role of strategic planning and development for advertising.

Lisa will be with us for the next two weeks. During that time, she will help with the transition. Though we will miss her creativity, enthusiasm, and friendship, this is a great opportunity for her. Please join me in wishing her well in her new role.

And here is the MaineToday announcement.

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