COVID Coverage a Year Later-

Local media offers insight and lessons learned from covering the pandemic

Local media faced real challenges covering the COVID crisis. Photo montage: Steve Newvine

It was one year ago, March 2020, when life in our world changed forever.

The coronavirus pandemic changed life in many ways. Face masks, social distancing, hand sanitizer, outdoor restaurant dining, and so many other things were forced into everyday life.

It also changed the way our local media handled an on-going crisis. Five local media outlets were asked to share their perspectives on covering the COVID story over the past year.

The Merced County Times, KYOS Radio, and MercedCountyEvents.com responded. Repeated requests to the Merced Sun Star and KFSN-TV channel 30 were not answered.

“The biggest challenge in my opinion was the initial lack of press access to restricted government meetings that were broadcast instead of open for an “in-person” audience,” said Jonathan Whitaker, Managing Editor at the Merced County Times.

“Covering “virtual” meetings is no way near the same thing as actually being there as a reporter before, during and after the proceedings”

The Times petitioned the City of Merced to allow them access in the room for Council meetings as an emergency worker in the “communications” field.

After a week of review with the City Attorney, the local media was permitted to attend meetings in person.

“This was a natural disaster that caught everybody off guard to say the least,” said the Times Whitaker.

“I think maybe the media was not exactly the first thing on government leaders’ minds as they struggled with this deadly virus.”

Jonathan Whitaker believes local government relied too heavily on their own social media sites to get information out.

Brad Haven runs the local events and community organization website MercedCountyEvents.com .

Like the other media covering the region, his website adapted to the changing landscape. “I am not sure anyone thought that COVID would have been around for as long as it has once it was first reported,”he said.

“Our biggest challenge was staying up-to-date as much as possible,” said Radio Merced Operations Manager Christopher Moreno.

The company operates six stations in the Merced market including the news/talk station KYOS 1480.

“We sought to strategically place alerts throughout the day so as to not bombard our listeners.”

The station changed a lot of things during the early COVID coverage. Community Conversations, the weekly public affairs program, conducted guest interviews over the phone rather than in-studio.

Commercials featuring clients who traditionally came into the studio to record their spots were asked to record over the phone.

Live remotes, generally a routine activity for radio, disappeared in an effort to keep listeners and staff safe.

Some of the Our Community Story columns related to COVID over the past year included (clockwise top left) the initial reopening of downtown Merced stores, the Merced Symphony performing on-line concerts, Merced Mall letting shoppers know they were open, and the Courthouse Museum adjusting to the changes imposed to protect visitors. Photo montage: Steve Newvine

COVID forced the weekly paper and the radio stations to look at how their businesses dealt with change.

“We had to make various financial moves,” said the Times Jonathan Whitaker. “Some were needed, some we later learned, were not.”

“A radio station is a resource for information and a place of refuge for our listeners,” says Radio Merced’s Christopher Moreno.

“We did things like a COVID-free hour in the morning so that our audience could get a balance between information and entertainment.”

The local media outlets are proud of how their staffs functioned in the COVID emergency.

“A widespread pandemic was unprecedented for all of us,” says the Times Whitaker. “I doubt we would do anything differently with the resources we have.”

Radio Merced’s Moreno agrees.

“We did the best we could. I would like to see more live remote information like a vaccination drive, but we have to balance putting on an event while heeding health department advisories urging everyone not to engage in public activities.”

MercedCountyEvents webmaster Haven agrees that lessons were learned.

“The one thing which I would have done better is somehow helped more local businesses who needed free advertising and promoting.”

Covering a big story like this one brings back memories of other big stories over the years.

News media often carries out the routine stories such as a law enforcement briefing or a local government meeting all the time.

They record what they see, flesh out the story with perspective from all sides, and present the story in a final form.

A crisis like COVID forced everyone away from the comfort zones of routine story telling.

Parallels can be found in such stories as the California wildfires in recent years to el nino triggered flooding from several years ago,

Jonathan Whitaker looks back with a real sense of accomplishment.

“Throughout the COVID-19 crisis, our reporters were willing to put on a mask and go where news was happening.”

“We’re in one of those jobs where we can’t take the day off,” says Radio Merced’s Moreno. “We are an essential business.”

Life did indeed change in the early months of 2020. Like the rest of us, local media adapted to the change and did the best they could do with the resources they had.

And like the rest of us, lessons were learned. We all will be a little better prepared for the next time.

Steve Newvine lives in Merced.

His latest book Can-Do Californians is available at BarnesandNoble.com and at Lulu.com .

You can reach him at SteveNewvine@sbcglobal.net

Bees Work for a Good Harvest

-Hives are in place in many orchards throughout Merced County

Bee hives can be seen near dozens of orchards in Merced and other counties throughout the Central Valley. Photo: Steve Newvine

It’s a sight that is almost as welcome a sign of spring as the blossoms on an almond tree.

Bee hives are in place now at dozens of agricultural enterprises in Merced and Stanislaus Counties. The bees are pollinating the blossoms.

They feed feed off of pollen and transport pollen grains as they move throughout an orchard. Quite simply, the success of the crop yield is directly related to the success of the bees.

Greg Shved knows how important this link between bees and crop yield can be. He is a commercial beekeeper who is grateful this year’s bee season is winding down successfully.

“Bee populations are definitely still threatened,” Greg says. “The biggest issues are diseases within the honey bees themselves that are getting harder to treat year to year.”

Greg is part of Exchange Bees, a supplier of honey bees for almond growers in California.

Honey bees are a key component to a successful yield. Photo: Steve Newvine

Bees are not the only pollinators. According to the Pollinator Partnership, a non-profit group that sets out to protect and grow the bee population, bats, beetles, birds, butterflies, flies, moths and a few small mammals are also part of the mix of pollinators.

But all experts agree, bees are the largest category of pollinators for agriculture production.

Greg adds, “The bee season for spring pollination is currently coming to an end in mid-March. There are other seasons with lower demand throughout the year.”

The Pollinator Partnership states that one out of every three bites of food we consume comes from a source that needs pollination. That’s why any threat to bee populations is taken seriously.

“We’re able to do it (treat diseases that impact bees) with pollination money,” Greg says.

The Pollinator Partnership, also known as P2, points to relationships with research scientists developed over thirty years ago to study bees.

Conservation strategies have been developed, and many partners are making the effort to secure and grow the bee population.

A poster was created by Pollinator.org to help people better understand the importance of protecting the bee population. The non-profit organization is selling the posters with proceeds to be used to provide education on pollinators. Photo: Pollinator.org

In 2020, there was concern over the so-called murder hornets. These hornets made their way to the US by way of Asia, being discovered first in the state of Washington and later in Canada.

According to the Weather Channel ('Murder Hornets' Have Arrived in U.S.; State Works To Protect Beehives | The Weather Channel - Articles from The Weather Channel | weather.com), the hornets pose a threat to humans with a venom that in high doses, could be deadly to humans.

A typical hive of honey bees could be destroyed by these murder hornets in just a few hours.

The hornets eat the heads off of honey bees and take over the hives. That’s a scary thought for honey bees, growers, and the general population.

According to Greg, so far, California orchards have been free of this threat.

Soon the hives will be taken away from this orchard in the Central Valley and the next stage of the growing cycle will move forward. Photo: Steve Newvine

The bee season will soon come to an end by mid-March.

For now, many growers are hoping for the best in terms of keeping bee populations healthy, and their crop yields rising.

They will only know how successful the season will be as harvesting and processing resumes later in the year.

If all goes well, we can expect the cycle to resume again next year when the bees return to the orchards throughout California.

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Steve Newvine lives in Merced.

His book Can –Do Californians is available at BarnesandNoble.com and at Lulu.com

For more information on bees and their impact on growers in California, go to PolinatorPartnership.org and ExchangeBees.com