Farewell Tribune, hello CalCoastNews

November 16, 2023

OPINION by T. KEITH GURNEE

As a subscriber to The Telegram Tribune for decades, I’ve just canceled my subscription to what used to be my primary source for local news. After doing so, I’ll confess to some nostalgia about this move.

After being elected to the San Luis Obispo City Council as a 24-year-old Cal Poly student in 1971 when George Brand was the great editor of the Tribune, I used to rely heavily upon its coverage of the issues of those days. So why cancel it now?

Why?

It’s about the decline, its low-quality coverage of local news, and its increasing editorial bias in recent years that has compelled this decision. The Tribune has flat lost its way when it comes to investigative reporting and telling the real truth about what’s happening in today’s world. The political slant that has imbued its pages in recent years has lost me. Finding its lone redeeming value of printing out its crosswords and Sudoku’s for my wife’s enjoyment, we both decided it wasn’t worth it anymore.

The other reason for canceling has been the rise of CalCoastNews and it’s remarkable reporting. Thanks to editor Karen Velie and her reporting staff, CCN has exposed some of the most important local stories in recent years.

Her expose of the documented corruption of former County Supervisor Adam Hill and that of the Integrated Waste Management Board (IWMB) was masterful. The corrupt local beginnings of the cannabis industry and the mismanagement of the county service areas in San Simeon and Oceano was alarming and truthful. As for CCN’s truthful exposure of these troubling controversies, Velie and CCN deserve a local version of the Pulitzer Prize for courageous journalism.

So how did the Tribune react to CCN’s exposes? With invective and jealousy when it proved to be truthful. It trashed Velie’s scoops while covering for Adam Hill who has proven to be the most corrupt local elected official in recent San Luis Obispo County history. Instead of crediting her for revealing Hill’s web of deceit, the Trib tried all it could to defame her.

Then let’s take a look at the Trib’s editorial cabal. Its most notorious member is Tom Fulks, a caustic columnist writer who has acted as a consulting political strategist joined at the hip with Bruce Gibson, a former chairman of the SLO County Board of Supervisors and the chief political ally of Adam Hill when he was committing his indiscretions.

Under its current leadership, the Tribune has become little more than a propaganda rag advocating for the rise of the so-called Progressive Left by backing its candidates who have been cultivated by the Trib and successfully elected to the County Board of Supervisors and some local city councils.

Now our county and cities are suffering for it:

1. A potential 112% increase in Grover Beach’s water rates.

2. A massive increase in San Luis Obispo’s parking rates in its downtown.

3. The proliferating, outrageously expensive, and unnecessarily protected bike lanes through downtown San Luis Obispo and its neighborhoods.

4. Supervisor Jimmy Paulding’s transparent attempts to increase our property taxes by challenging Prop 13.

5. Rejoining the formerly corrupt Integrated Waste Management Board without resolving what led to its corruption.

6. The new Board of Supervisor’s attempted redistricting guarantee in the hope of guaranteeing the election of Progressive Leftists to the Board of Supervisors, thanks to the machinations of Trib columnist Tom Fulks.

As for the Change In The Tribune…

Recent months has witnessed a noticeably decline. For example:

1. The paper has gotten noticeably thinner. Last Saturday’s version only had six pages of local news.

2. The daily sports section has almost disappeared. The sports section is notoriously a day late, It’s just old news. And while it publishes articles on local sports, the results of Major League Baseball, the NFL, the NBA are rarely to be found.

3. The Letters to the Editor section which used to appear every day, has now been relegated to one day: Sundays.

It’s just not worth the money or the effort to read its pages.

So what’s to be done with getting local news?

That’s easy. I’ve decided to invest double the monthly rates I was paying for the Tribune by subscribing to CalCoastNews. It offers by far the best investigative reporting in San Luis Obispo County. For those who are interested in getting the real dive into what’s going on in this county. Anybody reading this article who cares about where we live should subscribe as well.

Support the truth. Support Cal Coast News!