Arkansas Publisher Weekly: March 20, 2025 by Arkansas Press Association

Arkansas Press Association PUBLISHER WEEKLY

Vol.20 | No. 12 | Thursday, March 20, 2025 | Serving Press and State Since 1873

Scott Loftis proud of accomplishments over long, varied career

It was years ago on the staff of the student newspaper at White Hall High School that Scott Loftis first knew he wanted to be a writer.

He was one of two boys on the primarily female staff, so it was somewhat expected during that period that he would assume the sports beat.

“I was an avid reader of the sports pages each day, so it actually came kind of easy for me,” Loftis said. “After I turned in my first story, my teacher’s jaw hit the floor.” And he was off and running toward a lengthy and exciting journalism career that eventually led to ownership of his own newspaper operation.

Looking back on his early days, Loftis said, “I wanted to be a Major League Baseball beat writer, but that didn’t quite work out,” he said with a laugh. But Loftis has covered his share of Arkansas sports over the years and still does so in his weekly newspapers in Carroll County.

In fact, as editor and publisher of the Carroll County News in Berryville and the Times-Echo in Eureka Springs, Loftis really does reflect the life of the weekly newspaperman in being required to doing it all, from covering government meetings, writing feature stories, selling ads, handing the financial side and, in the well-known phrase – assuming other duties as assigned by management (himself).

Loftis acknowledges that he is in a unique market, with the communities of Berryville and Green Forest dominated by agriculture, with some industry, while Eureka Springs is one of the foremost tourism destinations in the state.

Eureka Springs coverage tends to be very political, with residents strongly opinionated about a wide range of local issues, while that is much less the case on the more traditionally rural eastern side of the county.

“The two sides of the county are very opposite politically,” Loftis said. “In Berryville people think I am a crazy liberal nut job, while in Eureka Springs they think I’m a Trump Republican,” he said with a laugh.

“Needless to say, covering the news here can sometimes get a little bit tricky,” he added.

Loftis arrived in Carroll County in 2014, when then-publisher Bob Moore hired him as editor. He remained in that position until Moore’s retirement in 2021, becoming general manager for the publications, then owned by Rust Communications.

CherryRoad Media bought the property in March 2022 and Loftis continued as general manager until the company’s owner, Jeremy Gulban, presented him with an acquisition opportunity. Loftis became the majority owner of the operation on January 1, 2023.

Changing market conditions have led to adjustments in the publications. The Ozark Mountain Trader, a free shopper, was discontinued, but all but one of the advertising inserts were retained in the remaining publications.

The Lovely County Citizen in Eureka Springs was converted to online only at first. But, a local business owner offered to help

Scott Loftis

Loftis

Continued from page 1

offset relevant costs and it returned as a print product under the title, Times-Echo, a newspaper that had a previous 125-year history in the community. The Times-Echo, a free product, is distributed each Thursday in news racks and over-the-counter locations.

The Carroll County News, based in Berryville, is a paid newspaper and remains the legal publication for the county. It is printed on Tuesday and arrives by mail to subscribers on Wednesday.

The Times-Echo runs about eight pages each week, while the Carroll County News usually is 12 pages. Both newspapers are printed in Branson.

A monthly visitor guide was distributed in Eureka Springs in newspaper form, but it was converted to a full-color magazine and is doing very well. Loftis said Eureka! Magazine was planned for 10 issues a year, but its success quickly led to a 12-issue schedule.

Loftis feels fortunate to be in a growth county. Berryville continues to attract new businesses such as Tractor Supply Company and TJ Maxx and a new industrial gas company promises jobs and a solid economic contribution to the community. “I think the county is doing well,” Loftis said. “Eureka Springs seems to be holding its own on the tourism side and that always translates into a positive impact for us.”

Since Loftis has the responsibility of making payroll and keeping the bills paid, he obviously has pertinent thoughts on the challenges to community newspapers and strategies for keeping them viable.

“The challenges today are twofold, and they share some common root causes. First, there is much greater competition for advertising revenue these days. There are so many more avenues for advertising, and many advertisers believe social media marketing creates enough awareness about their products and services that they don’t need to advertise in print.

“On the other side, just as the internet has made it a much bigger world for advertisers, the same holds true in many respects for readers. There are so many places where they can get their news -even if some of that ‘news’ is biased, inaccurate or even sometimes completely false. And I believe our industry made a tremendous mistake in how it reacted to the emergence of the internet. To a large degree, publishers weren’t sure what to do and I believe the industry panicked a bit and just threw everything online for free. Essentially, we trained our readers to expect their news content for free. Now with our piece of the advertising pie shrinking, we’re trying to recoup some of that lost revenue by asking readers to pay for that online news content, and a lot of readers don’t understand that, because we’ve given it to them for free for so long.

“I believe the most important thing we can do to combat these issues is to work as hard as we can to be relevant in our communities. We have to provide both our advertisers and our readers with something they can’t get anywhere else. Yes, our readers can go online and find someone complaining about their water bill, but where else can they go and find a detailed report about the meeting where the city council approved a rate increase? Yes, they can look up the score of the high school football game, but where can they go to find out who scored a touchdown? It’s that kind

of thing that we can provide that no one else can. We also have to listen to what our readers tell us they want. We have readers who only buy our paper for the obituaries, or the jail logs, or the TV listings. We have to know what’s important to those readers and we have to report it. The tricky part is that what’s important to one reader might be meaningless to the next. We have to do our best to listen to our readers and cover what means the most to the most people.

“I also believe that keeping the paper relevant is the best way to keep and build advertising revenue. At the APA convention last summer, one of the presenters asked a group of us: ‘What is your product? What are you trying to sell?’ Of course, we all thought: ‘Our news content.’ When the presenter replied, ‘Your audience,’ It was a light bulb moment for me. If we can maintain or even build our audience by making sure we stay relevant in our communities, then we have something to sell to advertisers – we can get eyeballs on their ads.

“We also have to be conscious of how readers like to get their news. Some of our readers like the feel of an ‘old-fashioned’ print newspaper in their hands. Others like to read their news online on their computer or cell phone. We need to do our best to serve all these readers. We need to have vibrant, user-friendly websites, and we need to expect readers to pay for that content.

‘Finally, it is absolutely essential that we be visible in our communities. We need to be at Chamber of Commerce events. We need to be in civic clubs. We need to be at football games. We need to be seen, we need to contribute to our communities and we need to know our neighbors. Most importantly, we need them to know that we are their neighbors, and this is our community, too.”

Loftis with his wife Lisa, son Ronnie and grandson Liam at the 2023 APA Convention.

Reserve room today for the 2025 APA Advertising Conference

Loftis

Continued from page 2

As a result of his success as a high school newspaper sports reporter, Loftis was able to land his first paying job while still in school as a sportswriter for editor Rick Joslin at the weekly Pine Bluff News. He earned 25 cents per column inch, about $16 a week.

Joslin had a close relationship with Professor Dean Duncan at the journalism department at the University of Central Arkansas. Following Loftis’ high school

graduation in 1987, that connection led him to college at the Conway school, where he served as sports editor of The Echo, the student newspaper.

“I really didn’t handle college well,” Loftis said. After a couple of years, he was talking with a U.S. Navy recruiter.

But at that same time Bob Qualls, editor of the Baxter Bulletin at Mountain Home, contacted Loftis and offered him a position as sports editor. He recalls earning $5 an hour with five hours of overtime guaranteed each week.

APA’s 2025 Advertising Conference is planned for April 10-11 in Little Rock, but the discounted room block at the DoubleTree by Hilton expires tomorrow, March 21. Act fast to reserve your Thursday night hotel room at the APA rate by visiting http://bit.ly/2025AdConf.

The conference will kick off April 10 at 1:30 p.m. with four Revenue Roundup panel discussions covering event planning, digital sales, special sections and niche magazines.

Later, dinner and drinks will be served in a premium suite at Dickey-Stephens Park as we watch the Arkansas Travelers baseball team take on the Tulsa Drillers Thursday evening.

Attendees will reconvene Friday morning, April 11, for brunch and mimosas at the APA Headquarters prior to the presentation of this year’s Better Newspaper Advertising Awards.

A full schedule for the 2025 Advertising Conference can be found on pages 8 and 9 of this week’s Arkansas Publisher Weekly

His next stop was at the Arkansas Democrat, where Loftis had been trying to find a spot on the staff for some time. He served as a copy editor and was there on the historic day in 1991 when the newspaper merged with the Arkansas Gazette. “I had a byline on a football story on the first merged edition,” he said.

Loftis was there less than a year before accepting a position as a news copy editor at the Pine Bluff Commercial. “It was a great time to be there,” he said. “For example, we

See LOFTIS Page 4

Loftis

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had a four-person sports staff.”

He was at Pine Bluff for just over three years before heading back to the ADG as a copy editor in sports. He then spent his third stint at Pine Bluff before it was back to Little Rock, where on May 4, 2009, he was one of the numerous staffers involved in a layoff.

Loftis landed briefly at the Benton Courier before returning to the Commercial as news editor under publisher Mike Hengel. He stayed there five years before feeling it was time to make a change, thus moving to Carroll County.

Loftis’ varied career has come with great personal satisfaction, and he is one of those journalists who truthfully doesn’t really consider it a job.

“It sounds corny, but my biggest pleasure is serving my community,” he said. “This has changed over the years. Most of the early part of my career was spent at a daily newspaper in metro areas, and a lot of things that I now consider newsworthy in this market wouldn’t have gotten covered at those newspapers. That’s not a knock on those papers. I was sort of still in that mindset when I got to Carroll County, and it took a little while for me to adjust.

“It’s just different at a community newspaper. We really have an opportunity to impact our communities, whether that’s by casting light on some sort of government corruption or by promoting good news in our community. I have an opportunity to keep my neighbors informed. That’s also a big responsibility, and I never forget that. Every now and then, I’ll get a letter thanking me for what we do, or I’ll bump into someone who encourages me to ‘keep up the good work.’ That happened at the post office just this week. That’s the kind of interaction that makes me feel good about what we do, and it makes all the work worth it.”

On the personal level, Loftis is a big baseball fan and tries to regularly attend Chicago Cubs games. He and his wife, Lisa, a supply chain consultant for Verizon, love to travel, sometimes presenting problems for his huge commitment to his newspapers. “On a trip to Florida, everyone was having fun on the beach while

I was in the condo working on the paper,” he said.

Loftis is extremely proud of his two policemen sons – Ronnie, a detective with the Sherwood Police Department, and Ryan, a detective with the Gentry Police Department. Ryan has two sons –Hayden, 16, and Liam, 9.

He also is very proud of his staff at the newspapers. They include graphic designer Rhonda Worrall, office manager Melody Strodtman, reporter Rick Harvey and social media consultant Julia Borkowski

Loftis has won several major investigative reporting awards from both the National Newspaper Association and the Arkansas Press Association. He is most proud of the General Excellence awards the entire staff has earned in its division at the annual APA editorial contest, earning the distinction five years in a row and seven of the last eight years.

He said the General Excellence award for 2024 especially stands out for him. “That award was based on the work done in 2023, the first year that I owned the papers. We had a smaller news staff, and I spent a lot of time on the business side of the operations, trying to get us off the ground and make sure we kept the doors open. For us to be able to continue putting out a topnotch newspaper during that kind of an adjustment still astonishes me. It’s a tribute to everyone on our team, not just the news staff, but everyone. We all worked together to make that happen and I can’t express how proud I am of that award.”

Loftis also is honored to continue in the tradition of all the community journalists who have contributed their time and talents over the years.

“This type of journalism is important because we are the boots on the ground in the communities we serve. We’re the ones who tell the stories at a truly local level. No one else can keep our communities informed with accurate, objective information the way we can.”

Loftis with his wife Lisa at the 2024 APA Convention.

Green Eyeshade Awards turns 75 with new focus on public service journalism

The Green Eyeshade Awards, which recognizes journalists across the Southeastern United States, has opened entries for its 75th year, making it the nation’s largest and oldest regional journalism contest. In addition to the states already represented with the contest — Arkansas, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and West Virginia — journalists from Virginia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands will be eligible to compete for the first time.

The contest is hosted by Society of Professional Journalists Region 3 and Region 12 (Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee).

This year’s contest revolves around a renewed focus on public service journalism, recognizing impactful reporting across all platforms for “its ability to inform, raise awareness and hold institutions accountable,” according to a release by the organization. For the first time, every division offers a public service journalism category. These categories include:

• Public Service in Written Journalism

– Recognizes written journalism that sheds light on critical issues and advocates for change.

• Public Service in Video/Television Journalism – Honors video

projects that raise awareness, hold institutions accountable, or amplify underrepresented voices.

• Public Service in Audio/Radio Journalism – Celebrates impactful storytelling through podcasts, radio, and other audio formats.

• Public Service in Digital Journalism

– Recognizes digital projects that provide a significant public benefit through data, interactivity, or multimedia storytelling.

• Public Service in Visual Journalism –Highlights photography, graphics, and visual storytelling that bring attention to pressing social issues.

• Public Service in Student Journalism – Honors student journalists whose reporting has made a meaningful difference on their campus or in their community.

Entry fees are $40 per entry for SPJ members, $60 per entry for non-members and $20 per entry for students by the standard entry deadline of Monday, April 14 at midnight.

For more information visit https:// bmbr4.r.a.d.sendibm1.com/mk/cl/f/sh/ SMK1E8tHeG13E8ZTud0mF9MDb8lC/ iulhXpBoIkYq.

New USPS bundling rule for newspapers

An update to a United States Postal Service Bundling Rule was recently published in the Federal Register. The new rule revises the standards in the Domestic Mail Manual section 203.4.4, adding an exemption for mailings of 500 flat-sized pieces or fewer entered at Business Mail Entry Units from bundle preparation, among other changes. Mailings that fit that criteria may be prepared loose in flat trays instead of in bundles.

The changes are set to go into effect July 1. The USPS also revised standards in sections 203.4.5, 203.4.8 and 203.4.9, requiring all bundles of flats to have two or more crossstrapped bands or be shrink-wrapped with one or more cross-strapped bands except for newspapers that are placed in a flat tray and entered as exceptional dispatch. Exceptional dispatch newspapers can use only one strap around the middle to prevent damage. The Postal Service is also eliminating the use of rubber bands and twine/string for securing bundles of flats with the exception of First-Class Mail flats placed in flat trays. Also section 245.9.5(d) is set to be revised to reflect that shrinkwrapped multi carrier route bundles require two or more cross-strapped bands.

In response, the National Newspaper Association filed comments seeking an exemption to the rule for newspapers. “We’re disappointed USPS chose not to allow an exception to the new rule for DDU and Exceptional Dispatch mailings,” said Matt Paxton, publisher of the News-Gazette in Lexington, Virginia and NNA’s Mailers Technical Advisory Council representative. “Postal officials say that the bundling issue is still being evaluated and we hope to be involved in that.”

For more information visit NNA.org

Guest Column: A commitment to updating websites with breaking news can lead to more traffic and help communities

By Benjy Hamm

When I recently heard about a major news event in an area where I have friends, I instinctively called up the website of the local newspaper. What I found was unfortunately all too common –nothing about the big news.

Even as other media outlets, including regional TV stations, and sources on social media provided updates, the local newspaper remained silent for 12 hours before posting one story with only the basic details. The next update occurred two days later as the newspaper was going to press.

While many newspapers aggressively post breaking news on their sites and do commendable work during times of crises and tragedies – coverage of the recent fires in Texas are an example – I regularly find many others operate as if still bound by the old newspaper production cycle.

It can be hard to break out of that cycle. I had written hundreds of stories for newspapers by the time I joined The Associated Press, but nothing prepared me for how quickly AP journalists worked to meet their deadlines.

AP reporters typically had about five minutes after the end of an event to write their first story – actually just several paragraphs of highlights that could be used for the broadcast wire. Reporters then wrote longer versions of their stories even as they continued to make calls and track down additional details. AP sports reporters had a deadline of 15 minutes after the end of a game to post the first story on the wire, and then often quickly wrote two other versions as they gathered quotes and more statistical information.

Those AP deadlines were based on a common saying among wire service journalists: “There’s a deadline every minute” somewhere. AP reporters also were taught that working quickly should not lead to more mistakes, citing a common phrase: “Get it fast AND get it right.”

It might be easy to think of The Associated Press as a large organization with nearly unlimited resources. But for much of the time, the bureau where I worked had only one or two reporters available for assignments, and that’s another reason working quickly was vital.

I was reminded of the AP’s approach when thinking about why some news organizations don’t take greater advantage of their websites when breaking news happens. There are many reasons why delays in reporting can occur, such as short staffing, a lack of available sources, or taking extra time to confirm information. All of those reasons are valid.

But community journalists work hard day in and day out to show local residents that their newspaper and website have the best coverage of local news – better than the TV stations and the larger dailies. When major breaking news occurs, that’s an opportunity to reinforce to current and potential subscribers that the local news source provides unmatched coverage.

If local residents can’t find information they need about breaking news events for hours, or even days, then they will learn to turn to other sources.

Writing and reporting quickly is a skill that can be learned, but it’s mostly a mindset. As a newspaper reporter, I wrote most of my stories around print production deadlines. AP reporters operated with different expectations and deadlines that were set by the organization’s customers – thousands of media outlets.

Your readers have similar expectations. They might subscribe to the weekly newspaper, but they want important news delivered quickly. Websites provide community journalists with an outlet to meet those expectations and also follow up with additional coverage in the printed edition.

When breaking news occurs, treat the website as a wire service would:

Post a story quickly that is accurate and clear. The original story might contain just a few paragraphs, if that’s all you know. You can add a sentence that says the story is developing and you’ll include more information as it becomes available.

Update the story as you interview additional sources and confirm new details.

Think visually and add photographs, maps and graphics to help your readers better understand what occurred.

Ask readers to contact you if they know information that could be important for the story. This can be particularly helpful in the aftermath of storms, as residents can provide details and photographs from throughout your coverage area.

Your website should be an essential tool to help your news organization expand its reach. Updating the website frequently, especially with major news coverage, will help to reinforce your organization’s reputation as the primary local news source. And it can help to increase readership and even attract new subscribers.

Benjy Hamm is an Associate Extension Professor at the University of Kentucky and the Director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues. He can be reached at Benjy.hamm@uky.edu

95th Arkansas General Assembly

Legislative Report

APA is monitoring the following bills of interest to our industry and the public:

Bill No. / Author Short Description

HB 1042

Rep. Collins To Create The Direct Democracy Act Of 2025; To Repeal The Ensuring Access For All Arkansans And Voter Protection Act Of 2023; And To Amend The Procedure For The Filing Of A Ballot Initiative Petition And Referendum Petition.

https://bit.ly/3WHRRDt

HB 1141

Rep. Richardson To Create Criminal Offenses Related To Deceptive And Injurious Media In The Course Of Election Campaigns.

HB 1382

Rep. Ladyman

SB 12

https://bit.ly/3El11zK

To Require Certain Reporting By The Designated Protection And Advocacy Agency For The State And The Designated Client Assistance Program For The State.

https://bit.ly/4ilYkgk

Sen. King To Amend The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967; To Subject All Communication With The Board Of Apportionment To The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967; And To Establish A Penalty.

https://bit.ly/42zIutn

SB 209 Sen. Hammer To Disqualify Signatures Obtained By A Canvasser Under Certain Circumstances; And To Declare An Emergency.

https://bit.ly/4hAzAR6

SB 210

Sen. Hammer To Require The Signer To Read The Ballot Title Of The Petition In The Presence Of A Canvasser; And To Declare An Emergency.

https://bit.ly/4hUyDCS

SB 212

Sen. Hammer To Create The Document Validity Division; And To Declare An Emergency.

https://bit.ly/4aZsrXU

SB 227

Sen. Tucker To Amend The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967; And To Amend The Provisions Of The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967 Concerning Public Meetings.

https://bit.ly/42WfEUm

SB 248

Sen. Tucker To Amend The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967; And To Amend The Law Concerning Public Meetings Under The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967. https://bit.ly/4bvvF5E

SB 376

Sen. Clark To Amend The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967; And To Amend The Provisions Of The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967 Concerning Personnel Records.

https://bit.ly/4hk34lc

SB 506

Sen. M. Johnson To Amend The Freedom Of Information Act Of 1967; And To Repeal The Exemption Concerning Electronic Data Information Maintained By A Disaster Recovery System

https://bit.ly/4c1hwOd

Current Status

Reported correctly engrossed - House

Referred to House Judiciary Committee - House

In Senate Chamber

Returned by the Committee, with the recommendation that it Do Pass - Senate

Re-referred to the Committee on State Agencies & Govt’l Affairs - Senate

Returned by the Committee, with the recommendation that it Do Pass - House

Referred to the Committee on State Agencies & Govt’l Affairs - Senate

Ordered immediately transmitted to the House - Senate

Referred to the Committee on State Agencies & Govt’l Affairs - Senate

2025 APA Advertising Conference Registration Form

Newspaper/Company

Address

City State Zip

TICKET OPTIONS:

Full Conference, $125: Includes Thursday afternoon sessions and breaks, Thursday night dinner and drinks in a premium suite at Dickey-Stephens Park, tickets to the Arkansas Travelers vs Tulsa Drillers game, Friday morning mimosa brunch and APA Better Newspaper Advertising Awards

Baseball Game +1, $40: Ticket to the Arkansas Travelers vs Tulsa Drillers game for additional guests not attending full conference

Friday Only, $50: Brunch and APA Better Newspaper Advertising Awards

ATTENDEE NAME:

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Choose ONE: Full Conference Baseball game additional guest Friday Brunch & Awards

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Choose ONE: Full Conference Baseball game additional guest Friday Brunch & Awards

Email Address: Choose ONE: Full Conference Baseball game additional guest Friday Brunch & Awards

Additional names can be added on back or in email reply.

Full Conference @ $125 = Baseball +1

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2025 APA Advertising Conference Schedule

THURSDAY, APRIL 10

2025 APA Advertising Conference Schedule

1:00 PM Registration Opens - APA Headquarters

1:30 PM Welcome, Introductions and Announcements

THURSDAY, APRIL 10

Revenue Roundup Panel 1: Event Planning

1:00 PM Registration Opens - APA Headquarters

2:00 PM Revenue Roundup Panel 2: Digital Sales

2:30 PM Break

1:30 PM Welcome, Introductions and Announcements

Revenue Roundup Panel 1: Event Planning

3:00 PM Revenue Roundup Panel 3: Special Sections/Tabs

2:00 PM Revenue Roundup Panel 2: Digital Sales

3:30 PM Revenue Roundup Panel 4: Magazines

2:30 PM Break

4:00 PM Adjourn for break/attendees check into hotel

3:00 PM Revenue Roundup Panel 3: Special Sections/Tabs

5:30 PM Gates open at Dickey-Stephens Park

3:30 PM Revenue Roundup Panel 4: Magazines

6:00 PM Dinner and drinks served in APA Premium Suite

4:00 PM Adjourn for break/attendees check into hotel

5:30 PM Gates open at Dickey-Stephens Park

6:30 PM First Pitch - Arkansas Travelers vs. Tulsa Drillers

6:00 PM Dinner and drinks served in APA Premium Suite

6:30 PM First Pitch - Arkansas Travelers vs. Tulsa Drillers

FRIDAY, APRIL 11

9:00 AM Friday Only Registration Opens - APA Headquarters Brunch and Mimosas

10:00 AM 2025 APA Better Newspaper Advertising Awards

12:00 PM APA Board Meetings (Board of Directors only to attend)