The Four Corners Free Press is Printing It's Last Edition

According to the Colorado Sun, and journalist Kevin Simpson on Jan 13, 2024 : "The Four Corners Free Press, an alternative monthly based in Cortez that served up award-winning news coverage, a wide range of editorial voices and even a popular police blotter, will publish its final edition next weekend, ending a 20-year run and becoming another casualty in the decline of rural print publications.

Co-founder and editor Gail Binkly pointed to rising printing costs — a recurring theme among many struggling rural papers — and the loss of advertisers during the pandemic as factors in the decision to close the paper she owned along with her husband, David Long, and Wendy Mimiaga. 

She added that they’ve long been operating on a shoestring, but that the economics finally became untenable.

“It really hasn’t been viable for a long time,” Binkly said. “We just made enough money to scrape by every month. We like doing the paper and we’ve been doing it basically without paying ourselves for a while. But it’s just getting more and more difficult to do.”

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"Binkly, 67, hopes the Four Corners Free Press is remembered as “just something that provided an alternative voice and filled a void and covered some issues that weren’t being covered.”

Mark Stevens, a longtime Colorado journalist and author who moved to the area nearly five years ago, described the Free Press as “quirky in the best way.”

“It had lots of really good journalism,” said Stevens, who has contributed book reviews. “Usually, every issue features a couple or three stories that are a really good analysis of something going on, covering an issue. And then behind that, just lots of voices — so many different columnists and points of view. And she really wanted the whole spectrum of what’s down here.

“So it just becomes a chorus of the community.”'"

Valerie Maez, a frequent columnist in the Free Press stated :"As a contributor I always appreciated Gail's editorial role. To provide a diverse set of viewpoints in any publication has almost disappeared these days. The Free Press managed to do that, and do it well"

LKY: Even though I rarely read the Free Press, it is sad that our area is losing this long-standing printed voice. I am sure it will be missed by many.

I only copied part of this article. Go to ColoradoSun.com to read the entire article.

the photo is from The Free Press website.