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- Friday - Nov. 1, 2024 - Carpenter sees 'meteoric' growth, more layoffs
Friday - Nov. 1, 2024 - Carpenter sees 'meteoric' growth, more layoffs
Grace Kennedy
November 01, 2024
🌧 High 8C
Good morning!
For two Fridays in a row, my daughter has been home from school—not because she is ill, but because it is a Pro-D day for her teachers. She is delighted for another morning of sleeping in, particularly after the late night of treats, tricks, and dressing up. And although some might question the number of days off from school (there is a third Pro-D next week), I have to side with the teachers on this one. If I had the choice between corralling a classroom of over-tired, over-sugared children or silently sitting with a group of adults, I know exactly which one I would choose.
– Grace
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Traffic & Weather
🌤 Local forecast: Langley | Chilliwack | Abbotsford | Hope (We have had to temporarily change our forecast links to the Weather Network due to a technical error.)
🚘 Driving today? Check the current traffic situation via Google, and find DriveBC’s latest updates.
🛣 Click here for links to road cameras across the Fraser Valley, including those for the Coquihalla, Highway 7, Hope-Princeton, Fraser Canyon, and Highway 1 in Langley and Abbotsford.
NEWS
Eagle-watching, land-linking, and Remembrance Day
November’s events include eagle watching, land-linking workshops, and Remembrance Day events. 📷 Greg Johnson/Unsplash; Richard Bell/Unsplash; Phil Desforges/Unsplash
American author Louisa May Alcott once declared November a disagreeable month, but the Fraser Valley is doing its part to prove her wrong with a bevy of activities.
Fraser Valley residents can get outdoors at the reimagining of Harrison River Valley’s supremely popular bald eagle festival or visit an agriculture workshop designed to get young farmers out in the fields. Those hoping to escape from, rather than embrace, the elements can cozy up indoors with a three-day film festival and a local holiday movie. There are places to stretch the mind, imagine new solutions to global problems, and support neighbours in need.
November will also see locals taking a moment to remember the sacrifices of Canada’s soldiers, 110 years after the start of the First World War. People wanting to join with the community to remember the cost of war will find a collection of Remembrance Day events at the bottom of the story as well.
Related
Need to Know
🚓 Mission RCMP want help to identify a woman who may have information on last week’s Superstore fire [Mission Record]
🗳 Abbotsford West MLA Korky Neufeld says he will remain a school board trustee to avoid the cost of a by-election; he will serve both positions until the next municipal election in 2026 [Abbotsford News]
👉 Murrayville’s cenotaph ceremony is one of Langley’s biggest Remembrance Day events, but it started as an informal gathering [Langley Advance Times]
🐴 Chilliwack cowgirl Kaila Mussell will be inducted into the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame this month [Chilliwack Progress]
🚗 A 75-year-old woman crashed her vehicle into an Abbotsford McDonald’s Thursday morning [Abbotsford News]
🙌 The Hope & Area Transition Society is changing its name to Cedar Strong Prevention and Intervention Society [Hope Standard]
💧 Harrison Mayor Fred Talen met with hot springs resort management about the destruction of the hot springs pools; the resort said they could have handled things differently [Agassiz Harrison Observer]
👉 The encampment near Abbotsford’s City Hall could affect Remembrance Day services, the city says; the Abbotsford Legion and city staff are considering different options for the service [Abbotsford News]
🔥 A fire destroyed a vacant home in Chilliwack Thursday morning [Fraser Valley Today]
🎃 Vancouver may have started the trick-or-treating trend, according to news reports from 1893 [The Tyee]
🎾 An old Safeway in Burnaby will be turned into a massive pickleball facility for the community [TriCity News]
📸 CURRENT CAM: Congratulations to Jodi Luck, who was the first person to correctly identify this week’s Current Cam as the statue of Piper Richardson outside the Chilliwack Museum and Archives.
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The Agenda
Carpenter Media Group has acquired even more newspaper chains, but has also laid off 20% of the newsroom staff at the Honolulu Star Advertiser, a former Black Press paper. 📷 Carpenter Media Group/Facebook; karendesuyo/Flickr
Carpenter's growth described as 'meteoric' as more layoffs reported
The American part-owner of the Fraser Valley's community newspapers continues to buy more papers—and to cut staff at some of the publications it owns.
In late October, it was announced that Carpenter Media Group had purchased another small Oregon newspaper chain—EO Media Group. The acquisition followed the purchase of a separate Oregon chain in June. The purchase is one of a series of deals Carpenter has made since it took over Black Press in April. The BC-based newspaper chain collapsed into creditor protection at the start of 2024.
This week, the union representing workers at the largest former Black Press paper, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, announced that Carpenter was laying off six editorial employees. Those workers, who made up 20% of the entire newsroom, include the paper's photographers, media website Poynter reported. The company's Hawaii-based CEO told a local news site that the layoffs were needed to "strengthen the company's financial future."
Such cuts, which echo those seen at the Everett Herald earlier this year, have not yet been seen in British Columbia.
The Current won a Jack Webster Award this week for its reporting on Black Press's demise, and the ensuing creditor protection process that saw Carpenter—backed by two Canadian Black Press creditors—take over the chain. In addition to the dozens of BC community newspapers it operated, Black Press's holdings include papers in Washington State, Alaska, and Hawaii.
Carpenter Media has rapidly expanded across North America since buying Black Press. Northwestern University's Local News Initiative noted that the company was the largest buyer of papers across the United States in 2024, describing and described the chain's growth as "meteoric."
The company now owns more than 130 United States papers, in addition to its dozens of Canadian publications. The Current has repeatedly tried to contact its executives for an interview but has not been successful.
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🗓 Things to do
Dinosaur day: Kids are invited to the Murrayville Library to explore dinosaurs during a paleontology dig on Sunday, Nov. 3 at 3:30pm. Details online.
Hockey afternoon: The Mission Outlaws play the Langley Trappers at the George Preston Recreation Centre on Sunday, Nov. 3 at 2:30pm. Details online.
Movie night: Reel on the River presents Sweetland, an independent film about a decaying fishing community in Newfoundland, on Monday, Nov. 4. The film starts at 7pm at the SilverCity Cineplex Theatre in Mission. Tickets are $10. Details online.
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