Kamloops' last newspaper to cease operations next week

The last remaining newspaper in Kamloops, B.C., will publish its last edition on Oct. 25, after more than 35 years in the community. 

Kamloops This Week, which has been in print since 1988, publishes once a week and runs a website that's updated daily. Both will be shut down this month. According to its website, the paper is delivered to about 30,000 homes each week, in a city of about 98,000 residents. 

Owner and publisher Robert Doull says 26 people, plus carriers, will lose their jobs as a result.

In 2014, the last daily newspaper in the Tournament Capital shut down due to declining revenue. More than 50 people lost their jobs, and locals were left without a physical paper each morning on their doorstep. 

Six weeks ago, Kamloops This Week published a piece titled Kamloops This Week is NOT closing in response to rumours in the community. Doull says that since then, their printer has gone out of business, and the cost a new printer planned to charge was out of the paper's budget. 

He also pointed to issues with Google and Meta blocking Canadian news links, making it difficult to get page views and the ad revenue associated with them. 

"It's really just kind of a bunch of cost issues have accumulated," he said. "We're kind of swimming upstream."

City Councillor Kelly Hall, who is also a former publisher for the paper, said not having a newspaper in the city is "extremely disappointing."

"It's a very sad day for journalism in Kamloops," he said.

Editor Chris Foulds said he hopes Kamloopsians will support other local news outlets and keep them from suffering the same fate. 

"Every time a news outlet dies ... it costs more than just money to the taxpayers," he said.

"Just do what you can to support your local news."