Oxford Press

The Oxford Press suffers from one glaring weakness: it does not report news. While I certainly appreciated the regular announcements of what time church services start, school lunch menues, and the like, the «news“paper’s weakness left it as more of a weekly update on miscellaneous town events than a source of actual information.
As a recent letter writer noted, «There are things more worthwhile than a reporter’s personal life that should/​could be investigated and reported. For example, one irate mother wrote recently that she was convinced the gas stations in Oxford timed their Thursday price gouge to coincide with move-​in day at Miami. While her conclusions were wrong, her observations were not. Gas does indeed go up every Thursday in this town, as anyone who lives here can attest. Why not investigate the reasons and report on that?
For the past two weeks, there has been little or no observable work being done to open the intersection of Locust and College Corner Pike. This has created an incredible bottleneck at Elm and Church, yet there is neither a signal light nor a police officer there to expedite the flow. Why not look into this frustrating situation and find some answers?
There are countless other observations that beg to be investigated by a local press with curiosity: the glut of vacant students rentals; a beautiful shopping plaza with over half the spaces still empty; and the triple-​redundancy in drug stores in a town with little competition in groceries are just some of the things that come to mind. I understand that a local paper must have its share of grip/​grin pictures, as well as adequate school and sports coverage, but I guess I’ll continue to get the real news in the Kroger aisle and around the water cooler.»
As I don’t live in town anymore, I can’t get real news at Kroger. At most, I look to the letters to the editor (which are not regularly posted on the Internet due to the Oxford Press’s low-​quality website), from which I can piece together what’s happening.
Honestly, I have no idea why this paper is so bad. I see interns from Miami publishing in the newspaper, and I know some of the journalism profs – they have some idea about what the reporting of news entails. I’ve even met Bob Ratterman (the man in charge) on more than one occasion, and he didn’t seem the naïve and slow-​witted booster his columns make him out to be. What is going on with this newspaper? What is it doing to otherwise smart folks who certainly have the capacity to do some minimal investigative journalism? And, as the letter writer pointed out, what the heck is going on with construction in Oxford? What about some in-​depth analysis of the relationship between parking, commercial space, and a walkable city (discussed in part at a recent city council meeting – minutes available on the Internet)?
Note that I give the Oxford Press 2 stars rather than 1 because it does function as a public community forum through its letters section, and it permits area residents to submit articles. Together, these two features permit me to get some news from the paper. Also, its status quo reportage does permit me to find out the very basics of the official explanation for the narrow range of things the paper reports on. It is certainly not the place to look for anything beyond that, but it’s better than a supermarket flier or a tourism website.
UPDATE: I lowered the rating to one star because the Oxford Press website no longer has easy access to the letters section. So now it’s just totally useless.