The daily Herald newspaper has gone so far off the deep end, abandoning their professional responsibility to Monterey Peninsula readers – that we need a whole new newspaper of record. A newspaper that explicitly refuses to hire such horrible anti-public interest staff as the Herald’s letters editor (Calkins) or their news manager (Livernois).
The Herald reporting has gotten so bad, covers so few important local stories (often only 2-4 local stories a day, and they haven’t attended or reported on our Water District meetings in years), and biases those that it does cover — it has ceased to be a newspaper. It has now become the Monterey County Daily Advertiser’s Puppet.
One example: For 9 years the Herald has refused to report so much as a word (let alone a single declarative sentence) on the most important solution to our water problem – our own Water Management District’s “Right-sized” desalination solution.
However, instead of mentioning the existing Water Management District, who we vote for, and their solutions — they propose making a whole new government agency – wholly ignoring that our existing water agency is already solving the problem.
I recently predicted the Herald would be out of business soon. Now I may just dance when they are out of business. And may their cynical grumpy old men be replaced with a responsible news team that actually cares about our Peninsula community.
Keep your eyes on the PG Hometown Bulletin. They are trying hard.
Update 2014: This was written before the PG Hometown Bulletin was “sold” to the Cedar Street Times (they are being sued for refusing to pay the former publisher for it) which is even worse at censoring stories and letters to the editor.
References:
“Editorial: Ratepayers need water representation”
