Our new publication, Salinas Valley Now, is filling in a news desert.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Journalism is under dire threat. According to a 2025 study, “The State of Local News” from the Medill school at Northwestern University, employment in journalism has declined by 75 percent in the last 20 years. More than 270,000 jobs have been lost in the industry since 2005 and 40 percent of local news outlets have closed during that time. News deserts – locations underserved or without reliable professional journalism – have spread across the country.

SNAFU: Situation Normal, All F#&ked Up.

It’s all true, and yet, it’s not the whole story.

We here at the Weekly are bucking those trends.

I am proud to announce that on Monday, May 11, we launched a brand-new, daily, digital newsletter and website under the name Salinas Valley Now.

While Salinas Valley is known as the Salad Bowl of the World, the people who grow our produce live in a news desert.

With its 250,000 residents, 80.3 percent of whom identify as Hispanic or Latino, the Salinas Valley is home to an $11.7 billion annual agriculture industry and the center of emerging ag tech innovation hub.

Today, Salinas Valley communities are facing many of the most urgent problems experienced anywhere in California – housing affordability, access to health care, low-wage jobs, technology dislocation, child care obstacles, public safety threats and, most recently, the upheaval of the social order as a result of federal immigration policies.

These are urgent issues that deserve media coverage, but the once-daily, corporate-owned Salinas Californian has essentially abandoned Salinas.

We are going to remedy that.

Salinas Valley Now will be a close facsimile of Monterey County Now, the award-winning newsletter and website from Monterey County Weekly. The paper has long covered the county, including the Salinas Valley, with 20 percent of print issues distributed in this market. But for all intents and purposes, Salinas and the Salinas Valley do not have a dedicated news source that they can claim as their own. That is the change we hope to bring to the community.

We have hired three additional people to report, edit and produce the newsletter and website. Salinas Valley Now is a daily digital news source comprising a newsletter with three or four news stories sent out via email and WhatsApp every weekday afternoon, in English and in Spanish, all available for free. These newsletters will showcase the top stories from the companion website, salinasvalleynow.com, also available in both English and Spanish.

Salinas Valley Now will feature well-reported and edited news stories. It will showcase the people, politics and culture that make this such a vibrant community. It will expand upon the type of coverage our readers are used to in Monterey County Now and Monterey County Weekly, adding to the volume and depth of coverage we provide, with a focus on this region.

Data shows that trustworthy local journalism increases voter turnout, decreases fraud and nepotism, and strengthens bonds within a community. It is the secret sauce of democracy. And from our long history in this region, we know firsthand that good journalism is good business.

Our plan calls for a three-year runway to take Salinas Valley Now to profitability. To get there we will raise funds from philanthropy and grants to pay for staff, marketing and operations. That is $780,000 for the first three years. We have raised about $300,000 so far and our fundraising will continue.

Monterey County Weekly and its companion newsletters, websites and magazines are a successful, locally owned and deeply connected news operation that has a 38-year track record of award-winning journalism and community impact.

We have an experienced and talented staff of reporters, editors, designers, salespeople and digital producers. In fact, for the past two years the Weekly has earned first place in the General Excellence category for large weekly newspapers, the highest honor at the California Journalism Awards.

We are bullish on the future of local journalism in our county and I invite you to sign up for Salinas Valley Now.

Erik Cushman is the publisher of Monterey County Weekly, Monterey County Now and Salinas Valley Now. Reach him at erik@montereycountynow.com. Sign up at salinasvalleynow.com.