Juneau Empire changes signify concerning trend for Alaska newspapers’ future, longtime journalist says

JUNEAU, Alaska (KTUU) – A longtime Alaska journalist says Juneau Empire staff changes that publicly played out on social media earlier this week speak to the bigger picture of a concerning trend for the future for Alaska newspapers.

“I think it’s changing and if we don’t figure out what works, it’s going to die,” said Wrangell Sentinel Publisher Larry Persily, who’s spent more than five decades working in various Alaska journalism and government roles.

“It used to be advertising carried most of the budget for newsrooms. Now it’s going to be readership,” he added. “But we’ve got less readership, so we’ve got to come up with some answer or it’s a terminal illness.”

Persily’s assessment of the state of newspaper journalism comes after former editor Mark Sabbatini’s announcement Monday on the newspaper’s official Facebook page.

“I am resigning from the Juneau Empire, after giving notice three weeks ago, as of Tuesday, June 17,” Sabbatini wrote in the post. “There is no local successor planned.

“Instead the paper will be edited/managed remotely from Kenai (where the Peninsula Clarion, a sister paper, is based), with assistance from Carpenter Media’s offices in Canada and/or Washington state.”

Speaking with Alaska’s News Source Wednesday, Sabbatini — who returned to the Empire in 2022 before becoming editor in 2023 — said he determined his position would not be replaced from conversations with the paper’s Mississippi-based owner, Carpenter Media Group, who have not returned a request for comment.

“They didn’t technically fire me, they just told me I wasn’t required to come into work anymore before my employment ended at the end of the day Tuesday,” Sabbatini said Wednesday, after the post had been removed. “They also disconnected my ability to access any of their systems. So essentially, I consider that being fired.”

Sabbatini, who also served as an Empire reporter from 1995 to 2006, said that to his knowledge, the newspaper would still staff locally-based Juneau reporters, saying his resignation came after differences of opinion with owners over the direction the paper was moving.

First published in 1912 under the name Alaska Daily Empire, the paper discontinued printing locally two years ago, following a trend of what many consider a decline in local media.

Carpenter Media Group purchased the Empire’s parent company, Sound Publishing, for $100 million from Black Press Media last year amid financial struggles. The purchase included two other Alaska papers under Sound Publishing: The Peninsula Clarion and the Homer News.

As for the future, Sabbatini said he plans to look at online-specific newspaper models like the Nome Nugget, the Mat-Su Sentinel, and the Wrangell Sentinel, as he launches a new nonprofit online newspaper, the Juneau Independent, which he said will go live online Friday.

“The thing is there’s some fantastic journalism work going on these days,” Sabbatini said. “It’s just not always getting read and it’s just not always what’s the most popular or most profitable.”

In addition to the loss of advertising revenue, which Persily correlates to free social media platforms, he also cited printing costs as another stifling factor facing local journalism.

While the Wrangell Sentinel has been exclusively a weekly paper since it began in 1902, Persily said it has lost money every year since he’s owned it due to the high cost of printing.

In 2023, Sound Publishing discontinued daily printing of the Empire, reducing print editions to only two times a week, opting to print from Lakewood, Washington, to much public scrutiny.

The Peninsula Clarion also cut back printing in 2024, going from Wednesdays and Saturdays to printing one weekly edition on Fridays. The weekly Homer News, too, scaled back, switching to non-local printing.

And they’re far from alone; as many papers begin to scale back print editions to prioritize online, Persily said there’s still the problem of losing the readership that prefers printed copies in hand over digital content on screens.

“Every paper in Alaska is financially challenged and has problems,” Persily said. “We’re just we’ve got to convert people to online and then find some way to make enough money off online from advertising and readers. And we’re not alone, the whole country is going through that.”

Persily, who has periodically served as the Wrangell Sentinel’s publisher since 1976, said finding a solution lies in acknowledging there is an abundance of questionable online content that has created a barrier between the public and credible local news sources.

“We’ve got to figure out where the public is getting their news and get them real news — not the other garbage that comes in over their phone — to establish newsrooms where there’s radio, TV, newspapers, online news sites to build and maintain credibility, so people come to those sites,” Persily said.

Alaska’s News Source reached out to Carpenter Media, Sound Publishing and the Peninsula Clarion for comment, but had not received a response as of publication time.

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