In changing media landscape, is bigger always better?

As the latest media dust-up plays out (King Kong vs. Godzilla, Beowulf vs. the Kraken: pick your metaphor) some people realize we’re not just bystanders. Today’s media giants have changed from one-time players like General Electric and Verizon, but the information and entertainment Americans need or want are affected. So the Community Word asked two long-time area media professionals and scholars to weigh in on the industry’s health, owners and models.

Netflix and Paramount both are trying to buy Warner Bros./Discovery. Netflix’ $82.7 billion offer was accepted, but long-time suitor Paramount/Skydance then launched a hostile effort to buy WB with apparent support from the White House and financing from three Persian Gulf nations. Both offers have opponents, from unions (the NewsGuild, SAG/AFTRA and the Writers Guild) to politicians.
“A Netflix-Warner Bros. would create one massive media giant with control of close to half of the streaming market, threatening to force Americans into higher subscription prices and fewer choices over what and how they watch, while putting American workers at risk,” said Massachusetts Democratic Sen Elizabeth Warren, who also opposes Paramount’s purchase. “A Paramount Skydance-Warner Bros. merger would be a five-alarm antitrust fire and exactly what our anti-monopoly laws are written to prevent.”

 * Do you think chain/corporate ownership makes a difference compared to regional or local ownership? Are there ways to balance business interests and public service?

 John Malone - The Communications Act of 1934 established that, in exchange for the use of the [broadcast] spectrum, licensees were required to operate in the public interest, convenience  and necessity. The Federal Communications Commission has licensing and regulatory jurisdiction only over the licensees who use government-owned airwaves. Since all other “non-broadcast” media companies (movie studios, Internet companies, and “Big Tech” operate outside of the purview of the FCC, the only regulatory recourse left is through anti-competitive regulation.

The notion of broadcasters serving as public trustees began to change in the late 1970s with the Carter administration’s deregulatory efforts. The Reagan administration accelerated deregulation by shifting regulatory policy away from a trusteeship model and toward a marketplace approach. Government would no longer mandate minimal hours of news programming, community-outreach efforts, maximum commercial units per hour, etc.

FCC Commissioner Mark Fowler said a television was no different than any other home appliance: “a toaster with pictures.” The National Association of Broadcasters rationale [was] “We have to provide these services because listeners expect them. If we do not serve the public, the marketplace will not be well served and we will suffer.” This philosophy failed to predict that the entire industry would scale back their “issue responsive” programming, among other news offerings. Hence, the industry as a whole would begin an incremental erosion of local content.

Remember when the “Big Three” networks (CBS, NBC, ABC) expected to lose money on its news content? CBS patriarch Bill Paley said, “I have Lucille Ball and Jack Benny to make my millions. News is considered a form of tithing for the privilege of using the airwaves.” In 1985-86, all three networks changed ownership and became part of larger publicly-traded corporations. The new deregulated FCC paved the way for massive cuts in network news. Bureaus closed, layoffs ballooned, and programming options that typically brought lower ratings than entertainment programs vanished.

The Telecommunications Act of 1996, signed by President Clinton, eliminated the national radio ownership cap. Most policymakers belatedly admitted it was a grave error. It created a “spectrum rush” where larger players gobbled up stations from their original “mom-and-pop” owners at unheard-of prices. For example, I was working at WTAZ in Morton at the time. Under existing media-valuation formulas, that station would have appraised at about $500,000. They were sold in 1998 to Kelly Communications for $1.8 million. This assumed that Kelly would flip the station in a package with the others to a large national operator.

Nationally, companies paid outrageous sums for radio stations using borrowed money. Once the payments began, they had to cut costs to meet their debt service. The largest expense is salaries, so stations were forced to pare back to minimum staffing. That necessitated cuts in content.

Basic economics includes the study of market failures, when the market no longer can make efficient adjustments. Two examples of market failure are monopolies and failure to provide for a public good. The first speaks for itself. As for public good, what profit motive exists for the creation of non-entertainment content? News departments don’t make money. So without a regulatory apparatus in place, most public good will suffer. Think of a city park. People like visiting it, but the land would produce more value as an office complex. Only regulation and government intervention preserves the park.

The bottom line is that some station formats demand issue-responsive news programming. News/Talk radio for one. And some companies do local radio better than others. The mom-and-pop operators like Charlie Wright in Canton are long gone, but some companies realize they need to remain relevant to their communities. Those who short-circuit that approach fail. Non-commercial National Public Radio-affiliated stations were more likely to maximize public-value creation, according to FCC documents.

 Debbie Hedemann - I've always been of the opinion that large corporate ownership can be negative. I worked in the industry during deregulation (the Telecommunications Act of 1996). While it can provide resources and support on a larger scale to smaller stations, it also takes away control from smaller stations. I've seen instances where a station owned by a large corporation has been instructed what not to say or to talk about/cover on their news programs in order to appease ownership. News/journalism is meant to tell the public what is happening. There should not be any barriers to that.

To be honest, I don't know what the business model would be except for the big corporate owners to allow the journalists to do their job as they see best.

 * It seems that audiences are eroding, too. For example, the Journal Star's own circulation numbers they published in October’s USPS Form 3526 showed a 2025 print/electronic circulation of less than 10,000 for a daily that once topped 100,000. Some blame smartphones or social media plus "news avoidance." Any thoughts or theories?

 D.H. - "News avoidance" is definitely a thing. Students tell me that they don't "do" news or they try to avoid it. They do not consume news, which makes it difficult to teach them how to be journalists. The other issue is that because most of their information about the world comes from social media, their algorithms are only going to show them what they want to see. If they don't want to see the news, they won't. If they want to see cat videos, they will. If they consume biased news, they will continue seeing it without looking at other sides. False news and misinformation are real and continue to be perpetuated. If they do consume any news, often they find themselves in echo chambers where false information can be reinforced.

 J.M. – Print journalism has its own problems. The industry never figured out a way to monetize the digital side until it was too late. The 2025 “Medill State of Local News” report shows that 213 out of the 3,143 counties in the country now have no local newspaper, and in another 1,524 counties there’s only one news source. Those that exist are watered-down publications nowhere near the size and scope of their predecessors. There are no easy explanations. I can remember when the Journal Star had more revenue than all of the television stations in Peoria, combined. The print industry has been forced to react to losses in revenue by cutting to the bare bones. When content is cut because of revenue shortfalls (editorial pages, local human-interest stories and features, etc.), circulation suffers.  

The news business has itself to blame for much of this. The programming of news for revenue and ratings has led to the shaping of stories to serve a target audience. Fox News and MSNBC engage in this practice as a business model. But the problem is also more nuanced. Trust in journalism has eroded exponentially in recent decades. There are too many agendas and not enough solid reporting going on in major organizations. This absence of trust trickles down.

 * Lastly, are local reporters still "hometown" or temporary residents with less history, familiarity or contact with everyday Peorians or sources, or just a promotion in a new media climate?

 D. H. - I think that local TV reporters are still considered to be "hometown." There are many polls from groups like Pew Research, Gallup and Knight Foundation that indicate that this is true – we tend to trust our local news reporters because they're our neighbors.

 J.M. - The era of long-time market legend broadcasters (Tom McIntyre, Bob Larson, etc.) is over. The new economics of the television industry have turned jobs in markets the size of Peoria/Bloomington into stepping-stones. Reporters sign a contract, stay for two years, and move on. I’m not being critical. I’m just telling the truth. How can someone become connected to a community in such a short time? This is just another outcome of the cost efficiencies expected from companies that are highly leveraged with private equity and bank debt. 

Dr. John Malone is Associate Professor of Communication at Eureka College who previously was a communication professor at Lincoln College for 18 years. He started in radio in 1987 and was Operations Manager at WTAZ in the 1990s, after which he became Program Director and a host at WMBD radio. His dissertation toward earning a Doctorate of Public Administration from the University of Illinois at Springfield in 2020 addressed much of this topic.

 Debbie Hedemann is chair of Illinois Central College’s communication program and manager of ICC’s Harbinger Student Media. After earning a Master of Arts in Radio, TV, Film Programming and Management from Indiana State University, her career started as a production assistant and worked many behind-the-scenes positions in programming, production, engineering, promotions and operations manager. She’s worked for an NBC affiliate in Terre Haute, Ind., a Fox affiliate in Bloomington, and Peoria affiliates of ABC, the WB, and UPN, and has taught at ICC for 22 years.

 

Big players: Four major corporations own key media in Peoria market

Cumulus Media radio group

Market capitalization: $1.71 million

President & CEO : Mary Berner

Cumulus holdings in metro Peoria are WFYR-FM 97.3, WGLO-FM 95.5, WIXO-FM 105.7, WVEL-AM 1140 and WZPW-FM 92.3, the market’s second-largest cluster (behind Midwest Communications). However, its 428 radio stations make the corporation the country’s second largest radio chain (behind iHeartMedia’s 860 stations).

Local Cumulus stations use some news stories from WMBD-TV 31 and the Cumulus subsidiary Westwood One, but after the January 6, 2021, attack on the US. Capitol, company executives warned on-air staff to refrain from broadcasting misinformation about election fraud.

 

Journal Star

USA Today Co. (corporate name changed from Gannett in September)

Market cap: $524.2 million

Chairman & CEO Mike Reed

The largest U.S. newspaper publisher, with about 100 daily newspapers and almost 1,000 weeklies, USA Today/Gannett’s CEO comes from a private-equity background with a reputation for buying newspapers and cutting them to the bone, mostly through newsroom layoffs, then leaving them a shadow of their former selves.

The Boston Globe in 2023 described how Reed’s management has resulted in “brutal and probably irreversible damage on already struggling news organizations all across this country.”

Although USA Today endorsed Biden in 2020 and opposed Trump in 2016, Reed oversaw USA Today’s decision in October 2024 not to endorse a presidential candidate. Nevertheless, President Trump that December sued the company’s daily Des Moines Register for publishing a pre-election poll that found Kamala Harris leading among Iowa voters.

 

WEEK-TV 25

Gray Media

Market cap: $516.9 million

Chairman & CEO Hilton Howell Jr.

Owner of the market’s NBC affiliate and operator of the ABC station (WHOI), Gray is among several companies (including Nexstar) interested in buying TV television stations owned by Cox Media Group – a deal that would require an OK by the Trump administration’s Federal Communications Commission. Given FCC Chairman Brendan Carr’s recent pledge to change broadcasting to favor mergers and acquisitions, and his complaints about content critical of the President, any approval might have conditions.

Also, federal rules for years have prohibited television-station owners from owning licensed outlets that reach more than 39% of the U.S. population. Since Gray owns or operates about 180 TV stations in more than 110 U.S. markets, “its size could prove problematic under existing regulations,” according to Matthew Keys of TheDesk.net, a media news and analysis web site.

However, Howell has made substantial contributions to Republican candidates and Super PACs, according to FEC data compiled by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, so Gray may have an edge.

 

WMDB-TV 31

Nexstar Media Group

Market Cap: $5.21 billion

Chairman & CEO Perry Sook

After FCC Chairman Brendan Carr in September threatened media companies that produced or aired late-night host Jimmy Kimmel’s ABC program – warning companies such as Disney and Nexstar, “We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Nexstar announced it would preempt Kimmel’s program that aired any of its stations (it’s broadcast on WHOI in Peoria) and Disney (which owns ABC) suspended Kimmel’s show. After a public outcry, Kimmel returned to the air (and recently signed a contract extension).

The owner of Peoria’s CBS affiliate and operator of the Fox station (WYZZ), Nexstar also is looking to expand, and Sook has expressed optimism that the FCC will relax the 39% cap on TV-station ownership and other limits blocking the conglomerate from increasing its already extensive control over local-broadcast news.

Days after the 2024 election, The Hollywood Reporter said Sook implied he thought some broadcast journalism was slanted, and he hoped "fact-based journalism will come back into vogue, as well as eliminating the level of activist journalism out there."

 Edited from a report by the nonpartisan, nonprofit FreePress.net, a media research and advocacy group.

First things first: shelter the homeless

Most people seeing a stranger collapsed in a field or injured in a car wreck would help, and we’d stop the bleeding before we tried to treat a cardiac issue. But detached from a sense of some emergencies, a lot of us shrug, avert our eyes and move on.

Homelessness is an unpleasant but real emergency, and it could worsen in proposed federal cuts.

There were more than 600 homeless people in metro Peoria last year, according to the count from the Home for All Continuum of Care for Peoria, Tazewell and Woodford counties, and it’s estimated the number is now about 800.

Despite the problem, the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) wants to shift from its “Housing First” model.

“A shift to ‘Treatment First’ policies could result in a major reprioritization of who gets funding and for what purpose,” explained Robbie Sequeura for Stateline.

Announced on Nov. 13, HUD’s overhaul would rescind existing plans just as previous fundings is exhausted and future funding is in the balance. Treatment First requires attention to issues like mental or substance-abuse disorders, before someone becomes eligible for independent housing. This approach was common among homeless service providers and federal policymakers decades ago.

The scheme would cut billions from homeless assistance.

“More than half of the 2026 funding for HUD’s Continuum of Care program, which partners with local organizations to connect people experiencing homelessness to housing and resources, will be cut for permanent housing assistance and moved to temporary transitional housing assistance with some work or service requirements,” reported Politico’s Katherine Hapgood.

The shift seems ideological or a new opinion of homelessness from the Trump administration, expressed by HUD Secretary Scott Turner. He told Fox Business Network, "What is the root cause of homelessness? Mental illness, drug addiction, drug abuse.”

In reality, developmental disabilities and drug use are less frequent causes than joblessness, poverty and a lack of affordable housing, plus effects from domestic violence, bankruptcy, and divorce, so veterans and seniors can become unhoused, too.

The good news, if just temporary: On Dec. 19 the proposal was blocked by federal Judge Mary McElroy, who granted a preliminary injunction to a coalition of states objecting to the change for ignoring congressional mandates and other reasons.

“Continuity of housing and stability for vulnerable populations is clearly in the public interest," said McElroy, based in Rhode Island.

Originally used in New York City in 1992, Housing First more than 20 years ago became preferred by advocacy groups such as the National Alliance to End Homelessness (NAEH), and HUD endorsed it in Republican George W. Bush’s administration. By 2023, a HUD report said Housing First worked best to lower the risk of chronic homelessness among participants, compared with Treatment First and other models. It contrasted that with Treatment First, which requires individuals to access treatment in “highly regulated, congregate facilities,” and show improvement before being eligible for independent housing.

According to a 2020 review of dozens of studies (“Permanent Supportive Housing with Housing First to Reduce Homelessness and Promote Health Among Homeless Populations With Disability”), “Housing First programs offer permanent housing with accompanying health and social services, and their clients are able to maintain a home without first being substance-free or in treatment. Clients in stable housing experienced better quality of life and generally showed reduced hospitalization and emergency-department use.”

Housing First is more sustainable, said HUD’s 2023 report, which stated, “Overwhelming evidence from several rigorous studies indicates that Housing First programs increase housing stability and decrease rates of homelessness.”

There’s no one approach to effectively address homelessness. Responses to the crisis have varied widely, from “bus therapy” (sending people away) and death (Brian Kilmeader from TV’s “Fox & Friends” in September said mentally ill unhoused people who decline treatment should get "involuntary lethal injection," adding, "just kill them") to converting vacant office buildings to apartments (like Chicago and other cities are starting) and constructing “tiny homes” of 400 square feet.

“While building more housing alone will not end homelessness, it is an essential component of effective local homelessness policy, both for preventing homelessness and to successfully, permanently house people actively experiencing homelessness,” said Katherine Einstein, a Boston University political science professor who co-authored the 2024 study “Planning for Homelessness: Land Use Policy, Housing Markets, and Cities’ Homelessness Responses.”

Einstein, who surveyed the 100 largest U.S. cities, added. “Cities really aren’t thinking about their broader housing supply when they’re constructing their homelessness policies.”

Locally, the City of Peoria and maybe Peoria County are trying to help shelter about 80 homeless people at  New Hope Apartments on Fayette Street and Jefferson Avenue. The City’s short-term funding of $200,000 comes from its remaining American Rescue Funds. The City/County Board of Health is considering assistance, too.

Again, HUD’s dramatic cuts are temporarily blocked by the lawsuit bought by Illinois and 16 states (plus governors from Kentucky and Pennsylvania, cities such as Boston and San Francisco, and advocacy groups including NAEH and the National Low Income Housing Coalition). However, even paused for the moment, the proposal still lurks, threatening stable housing for some 170,000 people, including many in central Illinois.

Teachers organize for students, parents and community as well as themselves: union president

Leslie Danage is starting her first full calendar year as President of Local 780 of the Peoria Federation of Teachers, and the union’s work is happening on many levels: planning for negotiations, organizing internally, enforcing the contract with Peoria Public Schools – and juggling everything in an atmosphere affected by national as well as local issues.

No union exists in a vacuum, but it can really suck to deal with multiple crises, if not chaos, coming from Washington, D.C.

For instance, on Nov. 18, the Trump administration announced what the New York Times called “an aggressive plan to continue dismantling the Education Department, ending the agency’s broad role in supporting academics at elementary and high schools and in expanding access to college.” Some of the department’s work is being transferred to other federal agencies with little experience in work such as distributing grants approved by Congress.

In Peoria, the challenges may be on a local level, but they’re real:

* in classrooms, the influence of technology, from ubiquitous smartphones to known and unknown impacts of Artificial Intelligence.

* outside classes, effects on students’ well-being challenged by social media and especially tied to family involvement;

* pressing state lawmakers to fulfill funding promises; and

* staying organized and nimble enough to cope with the “trickle-down” consequences of federal actions, whether the attempted elimination of the U.S. Dept. of Education or occasional fallout from the U.S. Supreme Court “Janus” decision seven years ago.

 

 “Public education is the great equalizer,” said Danage, a 47-year-old 2^nd grade teacher at Hines School whose involvement with the 1,000-mamber PFT has ranged from a union building representative to Woodruff Area Vice President.

A union colleague, Illinois Federation of Teachers President Stacy Davis Gates of Chicago, described moves to weaken the Dept. of Education  as "an assault on students, families, classrooms, and every principle of equity and public accountability – “a power grab.”

The American Federation of Teachers national president Randy Weingarten has said, “What’s happening now isn’t about slashing red tape. If that were the goal, teachers could help them do it. Teachers know how to make the federal role more effective, efficient and supportive of real learning – if only the administration would listen.”

There’s also the trend of smearing teachers, which has provoked Weingarten to defend teachers and public education, in speeches, testimony on Capitol Hill and her new book, “Why Fascists Fear Teachers: Public Education and the Future of Democracy,” a 256-page book that likens current attacks to foreign countries’ authoritarian regimes.

“Educators and schools—from pre-K to higher education—are under attack for teaching American history, for promoting excellence and equity, for valuing freedom of thought, and for protecting all children’s right to learn free from fear.” Weingarten said, “for seeing all of God’s children for the precious souls they are.

“Why?” she continued. “The perpetrators of these attacks fear what we do—the teaching of reason, of critical thinking, of honest history, of pluralism—because their brand of greed, power and privilege cannot survive in a democracy of diverse, educated citizens.

“Teachers solve problems for students, families and communities,” she added. “That begins even before a single textbook is cracked with fostering a sense of safety, dignity, and belonging for every child. So, I just want to say to all the teachers: thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.”

Danage is more diplomatic than Weingarten, but even from 800 miles west of the nation’s capital, it can be difficult not to be alarmed.

“We don’t want to get political in a partisan way, but it’s a challenge to turn my advocacy  brain off,” she says, laughing. “Some of what’s going on is seeing ‘the bat signal.’ It’s time to build power.”

Power includes managing classes, of course, as well as ensuring their voice is heard at the state legislature.

For example. Peoria teachers are dealing with AI, Danage says, adding, “I have to give credit to Dr. Kherat [PPS Superintendent Sharon Desmoulin-Kherat] with providing us with tools.

“As far as social media, it’s at all [grade] levels [and] the District helps. Even what we post [as a union] is limited.  We exhaust every other avenue before we put something online.”

Finally, engaging legislators in Springfield is work teachers hope will bear fruit in coming months. Danage and Local 780 activists took part in the Illinois Federation of Teachers’ recent Lobby Day, and they plan to return for a follow-up Lobby Day this spring, when Danage will be added to the IFT Executive Board.

“Evidence-based funding is closing the gap, but not at the rate promised.”

Membership is stable despite the 2018 “Janus” ruling ending unions’ mandatory, partial "fair share" fees for Illinois’ public employees who benefit from union representation but don’t want to be required to help share the costs. The decision initially caused some membership drops statewide for public unions, but Local 780 responded by focusing on member engagement.

“When the union-busting mailers start arriving, we hear from people and explain things like the benefits of representation. We have a form to show people the fees they contribute stays here. Our goal is 100% [of the bargaining unit], and we’re at about 98%.”

Lastly, the teachers union strives to take members’ commitment to students, families and the community beyond school buildings – bringing teachers and Peorians together for public-service projects.

“We have something often, monthly in the summer,” Danage says. “We’ve worked with the Fire Fighters, the Peoria Park District, and the Salvation Army. Now, we’re partnering with [teachers union support staff] Local 6099 in a service project to help members in need during the holidays.”

Two community projects stand out for Danage, she says.

“We’ve lent a hand to the Foster Village program to put together backpacks and all kinds of supplies, from toothpaste to baby bottles,” she says, “and we help out with Peoria Grown, a group that get fresh food and milk and eggs and so on to people in the ‘food desert’ in the 61603, 61604 and 61605 zip codes.”

 

A ‘small-town girl’ leads one of area’s biggest unions

A few blocks south of downtown Peoria, 47-year-old Leslie Danage recounts how she came from the small, rural community of McLeansboro in southern Illinois to Peoria to teach in Peoria Public Schools, having gotten to know the city from her Southern Illinois University at Carbondale roommates, who brought her here for visits several times.

 

1. Do you have a hero, like a labor leader or teacher?

My grandmother, a lifelong educator who taught in the same town, at different levels, until she retired. My interest in teaching came from her, and she stayed active as a retired teacher.

 

2.  What’s a big issue in U.S. education, especially one that affects schools in metro Peoria?
Accountability – especially in families. Kids are “raised” by devices. Parenting has evolved; the educational system has not.

 

3. What’s the best advice you were ever given?

Don’t take things personal. Whatever people say, it’s a reflection of what’s going on inside them.

 

4.  Coming into your union position, did any unexpected challenge come to mind?

“It’s a challenge to turn my advocacy brain off. We [as a union] don’t want to get political in a partisan way, but some of what’s going on is seeing ‘the bat signal.’ It’s time to build power.

 

5. If you were about to be stranded somewhere and could only bring one album or movie (and you had the means to play them!), what would you bring?

Maybe Bob Marley, setting the vibe. No! No! I’d bring “Waiting to Exhale,” which is a great movie with an awesome soundtrack.