LETTER: Connection returns more to community

Editor:
This week is Indie Week according to a Valley organization called Local First Arizona. That’s Indie as in independent, locally-owned businesses, and Indie Week is held to remind you to support your locally-owned businesses year-round.

Here in the Rim Country, the media and the chamber of commerce make a big, big deal out of buying local – and well they should. These are difficult economic times and we need to look out for ourselves and each other.

But here’s what I don’t understand: the Payson Roundup is owned by WorldWest, a Lawrence, Kan. Company that is affiliated with The World Company. How can the Roundup encourage the Rim Country to buy local when it’s not?

And don’t think for a minute that the Roundup isn’t sucking money out of the Rim Country. According to Local First Arizona, shopping at Arizona-based businesses keeps 43 cents of every dollar you spend in Arizona, compared to 15 cents for national chains

And lest you doubt that The World Company and WorldWest are big operations, combined they own the daily Lawrence Journal-World plus newspapers in Tonganoxie, Baldwin, Basehor, Bonner Springs, Eudora and De Soto in Kansas. Besides the Roundup, they also own newspapers in Steamboat Springs and Craig, Colo. The company also has the cable television franchise for Lawrence and also provides cable television service in Douglas County, Eudora, Tonganoxie and Basehor in Kansas.

Meanwhile back in Payson, Roundup Publisher John Naughton is president of the Rim Country Regional Chamber of Commerce. Could this explain why the chamber touts buying local but ignores the fact that the Roundup is anything but? Could it also explain why the chamber continues to give the Roundup sweetheart deals that other companies aren’t invited to bid on?

On the other hand, the Mogollon Connection is owned by a company based right here in Northern Arizona. At a time when our state and local economies need all the help they can get, the Connection is returning almost three times as much on the dollar as the Roundup.

For readers, it’s a no brainer. Not only do you support a local business when you read the Connection. But because the Connection is free, you save money in the process. It doesn’t matter how desperately they cut their subscription rate, they can’t beat free.

And then there’s the issue of honest, thorough, unbiased reporting, but don’t get me started. Suffice it to say, we need a second voice in the Rim Country.

And just as much as readers, advertisers need to stop supporting the paper that, according to Local First Arizona, sends 85 cents of every dollar to Kansas.

You do have a choice when you advertise. Choose the newspaper that keeps more of your money in Arizona. Choose the Mogollon Connection.

We need a second voice in the Rim Country, and we need to keep every penny we can right here.

Al Poskanzer
Payson