Hidden beneath the fold of last week’s Arcata Eye, in a small front-page story about digitizing the newspaper’s archives, owner/editor/publisher Kevin Hoover casually slipped in some startling news: The community weekly will cease publication on Feb. 14, 2014.
Reached by phone this morning, Hoover said he has both personal and professional reasons for his decision. Personally he’d like more time to pursue other creative outlets, a luxury that his current workload simply doesn’t allow. “Doing this paper eats my life,” he said.
And professionally he’s not satisfied with the product he’s been able to produce on a shoestring budget. “By and large people are pretty happy with what’s in the newspaper. I’m not,” he said. “It only has about five percent of the news I’d like to have in it. And really I’m just tired of doing things fast and shitty.”
Hoover published the first edition of the Eye on October 22, 1996, shortly after the demise of the Arcata Union, for which Hoover was a reporter. In the nearly 15 years since the Eye has become a popular — if sometimes controversial — source for community news, debate and humor, including Hoover’s droll musings on area crime (compiled in two books, The Police Log and The Police Log II: The Nimrod Imbroglios).
Hoover said Arcata — and really every community — needs its own source of independent news, and he hopes to find others in the community willing to take over that task before he publishes the final issue of the Eye (on his 60th birthday). “I don’t really feel like I’m doing an adequate job being the Fourth Estate,” he said. “I’m doing what I can, but this town really needs to make a long-term commitment to an independent news-gathering entity.”
With that in mind, Hoover said he plans to visit each Arcata neighborhood this fall, asking residents what they want in a community newspaper and what each of them can contribute.
“I’ve pretty much defined, over these last years, what an Arcata newspaper is,” Hoover said. “But I’m under no illusion that there aren’t people who can do it better — on all levels. They could run a business better, approach advertising better, manage people better, and they could probably write better stories in a lot of ways too.”
He noted that the media landscape has gone through an epochal change in recent years with the proliferation of Facebook, smartphones and blogging. This multitude of “shiny objects” vying for the public’s attention make community newspapers, if anything, more important, Hoover said, because newspapers provide an independent perspective.
“Every community needs one, and they’re the better for it,” he said.
This article appears in Last Call for Coho.
Bummer……
I will miss Kevins stories, and the Eye in general. If i wasn’t poor I would try to buy it.
Dang 2 more years of this crap?
At long last! all things must come to an end, too bad you didn’t die sooner.
Hoover is a cop!
Punkin’ Boy sounds like he’s been the subject of some of the funnier Police Log entries.
Kevin not only puts out a quality product but he adds a creative twist. The police logs alone are worth the cost of the paper. I hope he finds a way to keep his fingers on the keyboard for whatever version of the paper comes after this one.
So sad – I love the Eye. I have a hard time believing there is a higher caliber in Humboldt, but I’ll hold out hope. I sure hope Kevin considers spending some of his spare time playing Frank Zappa.
I cover the eye on am radio and do it for trade for an ad. I try to do the front page and the headlines are always great. People love it, some want it closed, The Arcata Eye has had a good run and will leave a void in Arcata. Either McKinleyville Press would have to expand, and that would mean a name change, or there is room for another good small paper in the future.
Kevin, fast and shitty has sort of become the rule of the day. I’ve seen it in many other areas of the media, too. I fear we lack the three “T’s” in our region. Time, Tools and Talent. One has to wonder how long you can keep the plates spinning before something falls and shatters. But, you guys have been doing so well with so little for so long. Good luck in your future endeavors.
I hope someday Kevin explains why he believes a paper community newspaper is more important than an electronic one. I guess he thinks blogs don’t have value, but he could certainly design one where only “reporters” were allowed to post… even one where the workflow went through an editor prior to appearing on the site.
The costs of putting out a paper paper are higher than those of putting out an electronic paper, forcing a greater dependence upon advertisers. In an area where much advertising is by an industry — pot — which Kevin has rightly watchdogged and criticized, that’s a classic problem.
Kevin and others know I’m no fan of the part of the paper that seems to be most popular. But I’m a big fan of his willingness to report on the effects of the local industry on his town. And I’m impressed by the courage he has shown in continuing his reporting.
If Arcata’s biggest industry happened to be chemicals production or nuclear power, the cool kids would be in awe of Kevin.
I saw the announcement but had hoped it was a joke. Closing the Eye will leave a huge hole, and Mitch, some of us LIKE printed media. Kevin will be a success in whatever he decides to do next.
I don’t have any birds.
60????? holy crap.
A zillion shiny gadgets will never overcome Kevin’s masterful grasp of human nature or deft editorial ear. The profound and the mundane are made equally fascinating in the Eye, leading the careful reader to seriously question his or her own values. And to think he gives away the blue-print each week for $1.
On a personal level, Kevin has been a tireless mentor and all-weather friend throughout the misadventures of this wannabe journalist.
I suppose the end was inevitable, though, for a newspaper that would dare to offer an honest documentary of the biggest story of the last 15 years.
Wishing Kevin all the best in his post-Eye life.
Ryan, are you suggesting that Kevin’s pot coverage is what killed the Eye? Please explain, since most of us assume controversy is good for circulation.
I’ve always been glad the Eye was there for Arcata, and really sympathize with Kevin’s backbreaking labor, never having time to do all the necessary work right. I’m grateful you guys have kept on keeping on so long.
Thanks for all the hard work and sticking to it, Kevin. Your books are permanent fixtures at my little cabin in the woods. Great entertainment!
Eldin, right on! Place them right next to your porno collection in your cabin.
As politically ass-backwards as that muthafucka kevin hoover is about some issues, it’s a damn shame. Long live the printed page, viva real journalism!
I’ll say this about the Eye: Sometimes I love its coverage, sometimes it annoys the heck out of me. Which, in my opinion, is the mark of a good community newspaper.
To those who only want coverage that annoys no one, I’ll paraphrase the editor of the recently-embattled Two Rivers Tribune, who said: “you have to decide — what do you want, a newsletter (only happy-spin boosterism) or a real newspaper.
I really appreciated Kevin’s hard-hitting, pulling-no-punches coverage of the recent fiasco in which a noisy minority of hysterical, hyperbole-spewing people threw screaming tantrums about the proposed Cypress Grove goat farm, while supposedly responsible “leaders” like Mark Lovelace stood by and just let it happen without having the courage to stand up to the verbal bomb-throwers.