Mahoning Matters Fills Gap Left By The Vindicator

The silence across Ohio was deafening this August when The Vindicator turned off its printing press for good after a buyer could not be found for the struggling newspaper. 

For more than 150 years, Youngstown’s daily offering covered local and international news, triggering fears that the closing would result in an information desert.  But The Compass Experiment, a joint project between the McClatchy newspaper chain and Google, will soon be using Youngstown as a laboratory to launch a digital newsroom called Mahoning Matters to fill the news gap. 

“The Vindicator was a contract,” says Mandy Jenkins, the general manager for The Compass Experiment and an Ohio native. “It maintained the ties between people and their community, and we have to do everything we can to keep those ties together.”

Jenkins first heard about the idea for this digital alternative at the Google News Initiative Summit, a two-day conference focusing on the future of journalism. She was attending as a Stanford University John S. Knight Journalism Fellow, and admits she was immediately skeptical of the approach. 

Jenkins was concerned that companies outside of a geographic area would not excel at representing local interests. So she stepped up to the plate to ensure community connectivity was part of the plan.

The idea behind The Compass Experiment, which will launch in two more small to mid-sized cities in the next three years, is to set up shop with a local editor, a few reporters and others to handle content management and business partnerships. The hope is that the stripped-down staff will allow for greater flexibility as each writer will boast a diverse portfolio of topic areas to cover.

Readers will be able to visit a website specifically designed to highlight the issues that are most important to each region. 

“In Youngstown, we know the community is always looking for news on big issues like government accountability and public health,” says Jenkins.

Though Jenkins admits that Youngstown was not originally on the list for pilot cities, news of the paper’s closing triggered a flood of interest. She seized the opportunity to return to Ohio and has filled key positions with former staffers from The Vindicator. 

“We’re looking for a startup mentality, people who are comfortable charting into unknown territory,” says Jenkins.  With a website launching this fall, Jenkins is focused on making sure that The Compass Experiment represents the interests of the local community, even if the digital offering looks different than the newsprint they have known for generations.  

“We’re not trying to be everything to everyone, but we’re excited to show Youngstown what a small team can do — and do well,” says Jenkins.