* The fallout from the Rockford Register-Star’s closure of its Statehouse bureau and the firing of Statehouse bureau chief Aaron Chambers continues, particularly in the wake of this supremely ignorant remark from the paper’s executive editor yesterday…

“We kept the [Statehouse] bureau open through some previous tough times,” said Linda Grist Cunningham, executive editor. “Frankly, I made a choice between the bureau in Springfield and local news in the Rock River Valley. It’s a loss, but losing another local reporter would have been worse.”

* Not only was Cunningham’s statement insensitive and ethically challenged (she is credited with writing the article and then quoted herself in the third person and failed to mention any names of the doomed), but also demonstrated a spectacular lack of insight into what a “hyper local” newspaper really means. Kiyoshi Martinez, who worked for and with Chambers at the paper, sets her straight…

Even before hyperlocal newspaper chain GateHouse bought the Register Star from Gannett, the articles coming out of the [Statehouse] bureau were hyperlocal. I know from experience that any story I did had to have a Rockford focus to make it relevant to the local readership, otherwise the editors wouldn’t consider it.

This was more than just quoting the local legislators. This meant cold-calling through a phone book to find some “real person” to quote in the story about how an issue affected them. When most bureau reporters could have tied off the story, extra time was spent localizing, even arranging for photographs to be taken so local art went with the piece and gave the story a better presentation.

At times, this was maddening to do, but if you’re looking for an example of how to make statewide, government and political issues local, I can’t think of a better example.

And this brings me to my disagreement with the executive editor’s statement. If you goal is to only cover Rockford in a geographic sense by having reporters only physically in your town, then you’re failing at hyperlocal. There are things happening across the state that will resonate in Rockford, especially when it comes to legislative action at the Capitol.

Simply dismissing the Springfield bureau’s work as not “local” either means you weren’t paying attention to the actual content of the articles and packages produced or you failed to communicate properly what you wanted from the bureau.

This isn’t the kind of coverage you can replace with one-size-fits-all articles from the Associated Press. I know for a fact during my internship of several stories, big and small, that would have gone unnoticed if the bureau didn’t constantly have a presence at the Capitol. State government is a complex and nuanced beast that’s difficult enough to sort out when you’re at the heart of it, let alone hours and miles away. […]

Hyperlocal doesn’t mean physically constraining yourself to the city limits. It means presenting information in a context that’s relevant to your audience. There is a vast array of issues facing Illinois that the government is directly involved in that residents in Rockford will probably want to know (or, at least, should know about). It’s simple to see that a news organization and its readership would benefit from is someone who has the experience and institutional knowledge of working a beat for several years on the scene.

I excerpted too much, but the post was so good that I wanted to make sure you didn’t miss any of his major points.

* And Rep. John Fritchey opines today at Illinoize…

In most every other state that I have occasion to visit, newspaper coverage of state government surpasses that in Illinois. Let me be clear, by ’surpasses’, I don’t mean in terms of quality. We have, and have had, very good reporters covering what goes on in state government. Rather, I mean that other states tend to have broader and deeper coverage of what transpires in their statehouses. The reason is straightforward enough - more reporters = more coverage.

What does this have to do with good government? It all has to do with the ’sunshine is the best disinfectant’ theory. The more information that the general public has access to about what transpires in government, the less likely it is that egregious actions will take place. (Not impossible mind you, but less likely)

One example that comes to mind is Cook County government. When I was growing up, (heck, until not that long ago), most people had no idea who their county commissioners were, let along what they did. But as the media started spending more time covering county government, and the impact that it had on peoples’ daily lives and pocketbooks, people started paying more attention to what was going on in county government - and who was responsible for it. The result is that elected officials, now cognizant that their votes would be subject to public scrutiny, have had to be more mindful of how they were voting. The change won’t come overnight, the recent Cook County sales tax hike makes that clear. But without a window for the public to look through, the change likely wouldn’t come at all.

I know we had a discussion of this just last night, but Kiyoshi’s piece opens up an entirely new avenue, as does Fritchey’s.

Last night’s back and forth centered quite a bit on Chambers and the others who have been “right sized” this year.

So, let’s look at the broader picture today.