Murrindindi Council looks likely to significantly cut its communications with residents across the Shire.
It looks set todrop its regular monthly full-page advertisements in The Local Paper, which have a combined print-onlin readership of 9768 people. The Shire is looking to prefer its own online communications.
This move will particularly affect older residents who do not regularly use the internet.
Murrindindi Shire’s Communications Co-Ordinator, Rosie O’Kane, indicated that the Council will no longer take regular full-page advertising in the free Local Paper newspapers.
The Council is going to rely increasingly on digital media, but will continue some advertising in the paid-circulation newspapers, the Alexandra Standard and the Yea Chronicle.
According to the Audited Media Association of Australia, the Standard’s paid sales has dwindled to just 1220 copies. The Chronicle now has just 335 sales. Those two papers have combined online subscriptions totalling 15.
Latest Census figures indicate that the Murrindindi Shire population is 15,197.
“Murrindindi Council is abandoning communications with many locals, especially seniors,” said Local Paper editor Ash Long.
“The opposition newspapers have 1555 sales, plus 15 online readers. 1570 copies serving 15,000 just doesn’t cut it.
“Paid circulation newspapers are a thing of the past.
“On the other hand, the free Local Paper has a combined print and online readership of 9768. The median age of people in Murrindindi has increased from 48 to 50.
“Many local seniors are the last adaptors to digital nedia. Many simply do not use the internet on a regular basis. Many cannot use the internet because of local connection problems, which the Council has been campaigning against.”
An estimated 37 per cent of the world’s population – or 2.9 billion people – have still never, ever used the Internet, according to the United Nations.
Locally, a proportion of seniors who do use the internet, only use it for emails with other family members. They are not connected with the Council through Facebook or Twitter.
As recently as last last year, Murrindindi Council issued a media release about the unreliability of internet communications across the Shire.
Cr Sandice McAulay was quoted to say: “Only the centres of Alexandra, Yea and areas in the Kinglake Ranges have access to NBN fibre-based internet and this only provides moderate internet data speeds.
“All other areas of our municipality are serviced by either fixed-wireless or satellite services – neither of which is reliable or affordable enough for home or business use.”
In May last year, Cr Sue Carpenter produced a video, saying that internet connectivity across Murrindindi Shire was unreliable.
Cr Carpenter said that the region had often suffered power and connectivity problems, and residents had been unable to reliably source up-to-date information.
The Council’s move abandons many of the area’s seniors, Mr Long said.