SPECIAL REPORT: New Jersey Town a Microcosm of Hyperlocal Coverage: From 'NYT' to Patch

By: Joe Strupp (From our April print edition.) The scene inside the Burgdorff Center for the Performing Arts on the night of March 6 resembled a cross between a PTA meeting and a church social. This gathering spot in Maplewood, N.J. ? a suburb just 30 minutes west of Manhattan ? held several dozen residents who noshed on cookies, sipped drinks and waited for the unusual meet-and-greet to begin. In attendance, however, were editors from The New York Times. They weren't there to introduce one of the paper's famed columnists; this get-to-know-you session focused on Tina Kelley, a 10-year Times scribe and six-year local resident.

Kelley just five days earlier had helped launch "The Local," the Times' latest effort to expand community coverage in the face of recent cutbacks. Targeting Maplewood and neighboring towns South Orange and Millburn, the online report uses unpaid volunteers, interns and local residents with some media experience to fill a daily blog with a variety of news, views and visuals. A sister site covering two neighborhoods in Brooklyn mirrors this effort.

The Times on its site promotes the approach: "Your town. Your neighborhood. Your block. Covered by you and for you." Kelley, a married mother of two who works primarily out of her home, calls it "engaging" and "forward-looking."

But unlike many of the community blogs that have emerged in recent years ? both attached and unattached to newspapers ? the Times effort marks a milestone of sorts, given the paper's status and the industry's problems. For the Gray Lady to open up shop in this way ? using one staffer to corral a gang of local residents ? shows where the newspaper industry must turn. "The way we are staging this has to have staffing at the anchor level," says Jim Schachter, editor of digital innovation. "If the New York Times is going to have a journalistic presence at the community level, it is not going to get very far using paid staffers."

In Maplewood, however, the Times ran into something of a local blog explosion. Just weeks before the newspaper set up shop, Patch.com launched its own site targeting the same communities. Well funded by Google Senior VP Tim Armstrong, Patch has a paid staffer in each community who also gathers local news and posts it daily. The site pays some freelance money to contributors, but offers nothing full time beyond its three main editors.

Then there's the site Maplewoodian.com, run by ... me. Full disclosure: I launched my blog/news site on New Year's Eve, fed up with the lack of breaking local news, which culminated in the non-reporting of former Mayor Ken Pettis' resignation in late December. An eight-year resident and tax-paying parent of two, I wanted more coverage ? and a site on which to rant.

Prior to these three sites, which launched in a span of about two months, there was one lone Maplewood Web "news" presence, Maplewood Online, which is more of a chat site and bulletin board than news source. But since 1997, operator Jamie Ross had the Web market pretty much to himself.

Much of this Web explosion came about from the Jersey town's lack of traditional media. Along with the New York Times' pullback from regular New Jersey beat coverage in recent years, The Star-Ledger of Newark, which borders both Maplewood and South Orange, shed 151 of its previous 330 newsroom staffers last year in a massive buyout, and has since covered these three towns with less frequency. Maplewood police, for instance, say they no longer get daily Star-Ledger calls seeking news and information. The local weekly, the News-Record, run by Worrall Communications of Union, N. J., remains print-centric; it has a Web site, but offers no breaking news updates. Its ownership manages dozens of weeklies in two adjoining counties.

Reaching out
Newspapers' use of a local blog approach, with staffers overseeing citizen journalists in specific communities, is not new. As with the Star-Ledger, a handful of major metros such as The Washington Post and The Boston Globe have recently set up similar online outlets.

David Dahl, the Boston Globe's regional editor, says his paper's Globe West Updates began online in November in nearby Newton and so far have spread to four communities. He oversees the postings by freelancers and residents, which coincide with the twice-weekly suburban sections of the Globe in those and other towns. "We are updating these pages once a day, Monday through Friday, and each has subsections for news, teasers and sports," he says. The sites feature a mix of paid freelancers and residents posting announcements, photos and blog items. "We are doing outreach to the communities, asking people to write posts," he adds. "The idea is to be an aggregator of online content in the towns."

The Post's online community page, so far, is primarily in one area ? Loudoun County, Va. "Loudoun Extra" launched in 2007 and has a mix of staff contributions and residents' reporting, with numerous blog elements. But Jonathan Krim, assistant managing editor/local for the Post's Web site, says more are likely to follow: "We are very encouraged by hyper-local opportunities. In this economy, you have to find cost effective ways of doing them." He also admits that revenue is only going to be worthwhile if a network of sites is built and pitched to advertisers. "Nobody has cracked this nut completely," he adds.

The Houston Chronicle, which nearly a decade ago was among the first newspapers to link to outside bloggers, has 14 sites in its Neighborhoods Web mix. Neighborhood News Editor Howard Decker says the news gathering is a mix of local residents and freelancers. When asked about the dangers of having non-reporters and those with little experience posting news and covering events, he responds, "it all depends on the context. There is a place for all of this. Readers have a tremendous amount of valuable information."

Are you experienced?
So, back in Maplewood, a suburban small town is losing much of its daily print newspaper coverage ? like many other towns ? and is finding online local options to, allegedly, fill the void. But are they?

No longer tied just to the local paper and the occasional Star-Ledger or New York Times print-edition story on a big event, we can get daily updates on many things. But is the use of inexperienced locals to ask the tough questions, or explain the often complicated world of municipal taxes and school district bureaucracy ? and do it accurately ? the way to go?

All of this sudden Web coverage has come as something of a surprise to this small town. Township officials who once only had to answer to the weekly paper now must contend with three daily sites with a variety of editorializing and expanded questioning of issues. When a press release went out from Maplewood town hall about police and fire layoffs, my site broke it. The Times' new Local site drew praise when it revealed that a Trader Joe's was being planned for a former Whole Foods site in Millburn ? not something the paper known for scoops on illegal wiretapping and the Pentagon Papers usually touts.

Even residents are getting used to the increased news offerings. Some now ask reporters at school board meetings or community events to identify which site they represent. Others admit being overwhelmed by the new daily outlets, and remain unsure which to trust.

"The last thing I was expecting when I got this job was that I would be going up against the New York Times," says Adam Bulger, 33, Patch's Maplewood reporter. A former Hartford (Conn.) Advocate writer with other freelance experience, he admits to getting less attention from subjects than the Times. "They are probably calling the New York Times back first," he says of slow township official responses in some cases.

Hyper over hyper-local
The two longtime local print news outlets ? the Star-Ledger and the News Record ? seem happy to stay out of the area's hyper-local community Web fray for the moment.

The Star-Ledger in February revealed it will compensate for some of its buyout losses with a new outside news service that will use some 30 reporters and interns to cover local news; it's likely some will appear in Maplewood. But as for a Local-style Web anchorperson in town, Editor Jim Willse says there's "nothing specifically at this time for Maplewood." But that's not to say the Star-Ledger will not launch similar sites elsewhere in the state. Willse cited the paper's Morristown Green, a blog that has been in operation for about a year, with a similar use of local residents and a Star-Ledger reporter overseeing it all. "What the Times is doing is rather old hat to us," Willse contends. "We have had this up and running for a year with a staffer and a lot of community input."

Willse did not directly say that the recent Web expansion in Maplewood, South Orange and Millburn had kept him from offering similar sites there. But he did say the Morristown Green approach would pop up soon in other New Jersey towns: "We have rather ambitious plans for a variety of hyper-local sites. There are many towns in New Jersey where this makes sense."

At the local News-Record, however, the weekly print product and once-a-week Web update approach is it for the moment, according to Managing Editor Katherine Paster. "We have a large following of readers that have been our focus and will continue to be," she says of the paper's print readers. "A lot of News-Record readers like to check the paper on Thursday, something they can hold in their hands." But Paster admits the new Web sites have forced her small newsroom to keep on its toes, something she welcomes.

Maplewood Online, meanwhile, has tweaked its offerings. Its long-running bulletin board of opinions and discussions has seen the addition of a news column offering mostly town events and productions. Ross recently instituted a "Maplewood Dispatch" with at least eight top headlines daily from all of its competing sites, as well as a handful of local blogs.

Meanwhile, Bulger ? unmarried and living, at the moment, with his parents in Wyckoff, located a half-hour north of his beat ? handles the Patch site with a mix of feature stories, breaking news and links to any and all other sites. Patch seeks to provide basic information on town government, schools and the like with a variety of items. Its seven to 10 daily postings are more in the traditional Web news approach, with less blog scrolling.

"We have a very robust directory of information," Bulger says during a chat inside Maplewood's Village Coffee. "There are lots of people online here. The personality of this town works for a site like ours." Bulger has mixed breaking stories on layoffs and police incidents with discussions on issues such as the best coffee and bagels in the area. "Whatever works," he declares.

Breaking, from the kitchen
As recently as a few months ago, Tina Kelley worked at least part of the time out of the New York Times' shiny new home on Eighth Avenue in midtown Manhattan. The only stories out of Maplewood on her watch were a dispute involving middle school students disrupting the local library and a feature look at the township's notorious "gum wall."

A Yale graduate, Kelley, 46, had served in newsrooms at The Philadelphia Inquirer and both Seattle papers. For the Times, her Page One stories had focused often on parenting and child issues. She even warrants a piece of the Times' 2002 Pulitzer sweep as the writer of 121 "Portraits of Grief" about Sept. 11 victims.

Yet Kelley contends her current gig is the most fun she's had. "This has been a plum assignment in that I have been able to create what I want in a Web site," she says during an afternoon in her Crescent Street home, working the laptop on a living room coffee table, a bag of knitting needles and yarn at her side. "It is an evolving, community project. You will not see it the same in six months."

In its first weeks, however, the site is a clear mix of breaking news, in-depth essays and local images and photos. It does not seek to be like the Gannett chain's Information Centers, which post a string of news updates starting as early as 4 a.m. at some sites. On one March morning, "The Local" gave notice of a meeting to determine whether a South Orange arts program would be cut; a basic police blotter from Millburn; and an essay by a local "wellness coach" about walking through the towns. A deer hunt in nearby South Mountain Reservation, which sought to reduce the population for health and environmental reasons, prompted a sit-down with Essex County executive Joseph DiVincenzo, to discuss the issue.

There was also lots of community calendar-type information, along with "The Fridge," the Local's site for contributed child artwork, and "Baby Talk," which solicits anecdotes and photos from new moms and dads. One morning, having to travel to New York City for business, Kelley posted an unusual ode to the New Jersey Transit train's internal message board where she swore she spotted a few haikus. Kelley's set crew of contributors are referred to as reporters, all unpaid, and each has at least some journalism and college experience. But the list of occasional amateur essayists is growing.

"There is a morning post, so people can check in and see what is going on," Kelley notes as she stops for a lunch of yogurt and cereal in her kitchen, feet up on a kitchen chair. "We are just carving the routine. I can't do every meeting. I am trying to send people to the most likely places for news." She says the demand for first postings by 8 a.m. has her rising about an hour earlier than usual.

Her eight-year-old daughter and five-year-old son also keep her busy when they are home. She still has to haul them to school every day, and be back on the laptop by 9 a.m. "I am able to do a lot of pick-up and drop-off," she says, not something every editor/reporter can claim. Perhaps, like other Maplewoodians, she will post one of their artworks on "The Fridge" before the school year ends.