Matapedia calls on the Médialo group for better media coverage

The MRC de La Matapédia is demanding better media coverage of its territory from the Médialo group.

Matapédienne news was until now broadcast by the leaflet La Voix de la Vallée, inserted in the weekly newspaper of Bas-Saint-Laurent, Le Laurentien.

But the MRC denounces shaky media coverage, which moves away from the promises made by Médialo when taking over the reins of the newspaper in 2018, previously titled L’Avant-Poste.

People were really worried […] that we become a stakeholder in a major newspaper and I think the concerns are true […]testifies the prefect, Chantale Lavoie. We were assured that there would be good coverage, that we should not be worried and that it would become the newspaper serving communities, readers and advertisers.she remembers.

That’s not all we see and [la couverture médiatique] crumbles more and more.

The recent resignation of the last journalist from Médialo in La Matapédia, Carolanne D’Astous-Paquet, does not encourage the prefect in any way.

Journalistic analysis is important […]it’s not fair to publish a press releaseshe argues. To work on several angles, not just that of the MRCthat’s journalistic work that we no longer have. For us, our interest in having journalists is an act of democracyadds Ms. Lavoie.

The council of mayors of the MRC endorsed a resolution denouncing the situation of media coverage, addressed to the president of Médialo, Frédéric Couture, to the editor-in-chief of Laurentien, Dominique Fortier, as well as the member for Matane-Matapédia, Pascal Bérubé.

Elected officials are therefore asking for an increased presence of the media company in the region, as well as more Matapédian news in the pages of the newspaper. The Laurentien.

Lack of funding

Faced with criticism, the editor-in-chief of Laurentien and of The Gaspésie AdvantageDominique Fortier, puts a downside.

For his part, he deplores the lack of financial support from municipal elected officials and the MRC from La Matapédia itself. Small weeklies like ours are supported by advertising, it is our main source of incomehe insists.

From the moment when Cities and MRC are no longer involved in the newspaper and we have to fight to try to scrounge up $150 or $200 in revenue from small businesses, that doesn’t give us enough funding to be able to pay a journalist, pay a sales consultant , pay for printing, pay for distributionsupports Mr. Fortier.

L’Avant-Poste, even before it became a section of the newspaper Le Laurentien, has been at a loss for a long time.

Questioned on this subject, Chantale Lavoie replies that the MRC is not financially involved with the media given its private status.

We have already paid for public notices, but since there is no more or almost no publication, our people look at it less and less […]. You can’t buy [publicité] when there is no news from our neck of the woodsprotests the prefect.

From Matapedia to Haute-Gaspésie

The journalist position based in the Matapedia valley was finally transferred to Haute-Gaspésie in the fall in order to cover this territory under the banner of The Gaspésie Advantage, according to Dominique Fortier.

The editor-in-chief explains this choice by the prolonged absence of a journalist in this sector, considered a media desert by local elected officials, but also by the desire of the community to invest in the newspaper.

It is an environment where, the Cities, the elected officials, the MRC and the merchants believe in the newspaper and are involved with us, so we preferred to go there for a post opening in Haute-Gaspésie, because on the La Matapédia side, both the City of Amqui and the MRCsupport for the newspaper was very anemiche says.

Dominique Fortier indicates that a freelance resource, based in the MRC Gaspésie, partially fills the position for the moment. He hopes to be able to hire a full-time person, eventually.

Prefect Chantale Lavoie mentions that a meeting with Mr. Fortier must take place at the beginning of January to discuss the situation.