To the Editor:

In your recent appeal for tax credits for local journalists (“Editorial: Urge Your State Reps to Support Local Journalism; Healthy Communities Deserve Trusted News,” March 21 - 25), you misrepresent your paper's commitment to "keeping citizens informed about what is happening with their local democracy," and to countering "misinformation and biased opinions."

You write in your appeal:

“Here in St. Lawrence County, North Country This Week and NorthCountryNow.com ... offer moderated opinion in our popular letters to the editor section. We help counter misinformation and biased opinions so common in unmoderated online discourse.”

Your paper does not consistently counter misinformation. My criticism of Lisbon Central School Superintendent Farrand's transgenderization propaganda, which propaganda was given more than ample space in a news article in your paper, went unpublished, though I sent it three times, the last time directly to Publisher Bill Shumway with the following appeal, which you never answered:

"Dear Mr. Shumway, I sent this letter to NCN a month ago and have resent it twice since, but it has not been published. The NCN article that it is in response to, ‘Lisbon Residents Call for Changes to School's Inclusion Board,” contains lengthy statements by LCS Superintendent Patrick Farrand attempting to justify the transgenderization of schoolchildren. My letter challenges his assertions and documents the dangers associated with the transgenderization of children and adolescents, information which is important for the parents of students at LCS.

"Your paper is the only one in the North Country that permits a free exchange of ideas. On the North County Opinion page, the text of the First Amendment is always printed. I hope you will remain faithful to your commitment to the free exchange of ideas and publish my letter."

I was very disappointed to find that I was mistaken about your paper and to realize that it does not, in fact, always permit a free exchange of ideas.

Your editorial said: “Covering village, town, county and local school boards is expensive. But in the U.S., the burden of reporting on news of our democracy is left to the private sector.”

Yes, but not only don't you send a reporter to cover the town board meetings in Colton, when a board member writes a letter to your paper ("Town of Colton Heading for Financial Disaster"), as I did, in which he describes the chaotic, extravagant, and scandalous goings-on at the meetings, you do not print it.

Your editorial said: “The time is right to support the essential role local news organizations play in keeping citizens informed about what is happening with their local democracy.”

I agree, but your paper does not consistently keep citizens informed about what is happening with their local democracy. Rather, it keeps them uninformed by not publishing letters on relevant occurrences, such as what is happening at Lisbon Central School and what is happening at the Colton Town Board meetings.

Tax credits for local journalists is a good idea. But to represent your paper as one that keeps citizens informed about what is happening with their local democracy, as one that counters misinformation and biased opinions, is just plain false advertising.

Kevin Beary
Colton

Editor’s Note: Mr. Beary’s letters regarding Lisbon Central School and Town of Colton were not published because they contained some unattributed statements our news staff could not easily verify and included excessively strong personal attacks.

Beary is correct that our limited news budget does not allow our staff to cover all 43 towns, villages and city in St. Lawrence County in the same way we report on news of the major communities.

However, we interviewed Beary for a lengthy September 2022 story after the Town of Colton directed its labor attorney to look into whether Beary’s August 2022 letter to the editor violated the town’s ethics or discrimination policies. That letter is at www.northcountrynow.com/letters/opinion-learning-traditional-value-and-morality-asserts-colton-man-0325016 .

NCTW / NCNow also published an October 2022 article reporting a Christian non-profit organization supported Beary’s stand.

Our paper and website have published at least six letters from Beary since the beginning of 2022, as well as letters from other readers who agreed and disagreed with his stands on various issues.