The article is here; here is the Introduction:
The commercial market for local news in the United States has collapsed. Many communities lack a local paper. These "news deserts," comprising about two-thirds of the country, have lost a range of benefits that local newspapers once provided. Foremost among these benefits was investigative reporting—local newspapers at one time played a primary role in investigating local government and commerce and then reporting the facts to the public. It is rare for someone else to pick up the slack when the newspaper disappears.
The local newspapers that do remain in operation are badly diminished. Most have cut their print circulation either by narrowing geographical reach, distributing the paper only a few days a week, or moving to an online-only model. Almost all surviving newspapers have made severe cuts to reporting staff. These cuts have diminished the quantity and depth of local coverage. Investigations that dig beneath the surface of police reports and press releases are costly and beyond most surviving newspapers' means. It is much more convenient, and much more common, to run low-cost pro forma stories that merely repeat the official line.
Local newspapers of the twentieth century had their own problems, but overall these problems were much less dire. When newspapers made cuts and their quality suffered, it was usually because management wanted to report high profit margins to investors. But revenues themselves remained quite high.
