Urgent and sustained advocacy needed for the LJSA

Nov 8, 2021

On the 110th episode of E&P Reports, Publisher and Host Mike Blinder sat down with the National Newspapers Association’s (NNA) chair, Brett Wesner, and E&P contributing editor Gretchen Peck to talk about the urgency for advocacy for the Local Journalism Sustainability Act (LJSA).

On Friday afternoon, Nov. 5, word had come that at least part of the LJSA — payroll tax credits for newsrooms — remained in the Build Back Better Reconciliation bill being bandied about in Congress. It’s legislation that the NMA, America’s Newspapers, Report for America and other industry associations have tenaciously lobbied for in Washington, D.C., and perhaps to everyone’s surprise, got traction and even a little bipartisanship for it.

Community newspapers serve an obvious role that most people inherently understand. Their local newspaper — whether they read it in print or online — is the very best source of local information about what’s happening in the community around them and why it should matter to them. Click here to continue reading or listen to the interview.