The ''Mount Vernon News'' is a print newspaper published once a week in

Mount Vernon, Ohio Mount Vernon is a city in Knox County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. It is located along the Kokosing River, northeast of Columbus, Ohio, Columbus. The population was 16,956 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. History Th ...

. Since 2020, it is owned by Metric Media LLC, a company reported to engage pay-to-play coverage. Most of the content published by the newspaper since the Metric Media takeover has been press releases and submitted content. The newspaper was originally formed in 1939 through the merger of the ''Daily Banner'' and the ''Republican News''. The Culbertson family of Mount Vernon owned and managed the ''News'' for eight decades, and Kay Culbertson served as the newspaper's publisher for 28 years from 1992 to 2020.

Metric Media

In August 2020, Metric Media LLC, a newspaper and media company that publishes 1,227 regional and business news sites across the U.S., purchased ''Mount Vernon News'' for at least $1 million. The new owners instructed staff that they would no longer receive

employee benefits Employee benefits and benefits in kind (especially in British English), also called fringe benefits, perquisites, or perks, include various types of non-wage compensation provided to an employee by an employer in addition to their normal wage o ...

and would instead be considered

contractors A contractor (North American English) or builder (British English), is responsible for the day-to-day oversight of a construction site, management of vendors and trades, and the communication of information to all involved parties throughout the c ...

; this led half of the staff to quit on the spot. Kyle Barnett, the new publisher, reported in an online "Dear Subscriber" letter two days after the purchase that the ''Mount Vernon News'' would immediately transition from its six-day-a-week publication schedule (no Sunday edition) to a two-day-a-week schedule (Wednesday and Saturday). The letter informed readers that "We promise to deliver more local news in 2 days than what you received before in 6 days." Five months later (in December 2020), Metric Media sold the building on East Vine Street that had been home to the ''Mount Vernon News'' for 80 years. Since then, the ''News'' has operated out of offices in the Woodward Building on South Main Street. In 2023 and 2024, the newspaper published an inordinate amount of stories that criticized Frazier Solar, a planned

solar farm A photovoltaic power station, also known as a solar park, solar farm, or solar power plant, is a large-scale grid-connected photovoltaic power system (PV system) designed for the supply of merchant power. They are different from most building ...

in Knox County. Within a year, 17 of the 40 print editions of the newspaper featured anti-solar power content on its front page. ''

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'' linked the newspaper's anti-solar coverage to a well-financed campaign by

fossil fuel A fossil fuel is a flammable carbon compound- or hydrocarbon-containing material formed naturally in the Earth's crust from the buried remains of prehistoric organisms (animals, plants or microplanktons), a process that occurs within geolog ...

interests seeking to scuttle solar energy. Residents in the community criticized the newspaper for failing to publish obituaries in a timely manner. As of 2024, the paper was published once a week and employed no local reporters or photographers.

References

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External links

Official website
1935 establishments in Ohio Knox County, Ohio Newspapers established in 1935 Newspapers published in Ohio