I would actually push back a bit on the importance of local news. I grew up in a midwest college town that had a fairly robust local newspaper, and my recollect

I would actually push back a bit on the importance of local news. I grew up in a midwest college town that had a fairly robust local newspaper, and my recollection of it was that it was a) poorly written and b) mostly focused on local sports and crime. While its mere presence may helped keep local officials accountable for their actions, I can't recall times where they broke local scandals. I have seen a few studies that have linked the decline in local news to things like polarization or increased municipal waste[1][2], but imo their ability to isolate cause and effect is very limited. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_newspapers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_newspapers [2] https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3175555 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3175555