Journalists don’t pursue their career for thanks. Compensation mostly is indirect, learning issues and interacting with people much more than pay. (A favorite quote about journalism-as-a-calling is from Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times columnist and novelist Anna Quindlen, who said, “Being a reporter is as much a diagnosis as a job description.”)

As Community Word editor Clare Howard prepares to move on to new projects after next month’s issue, I must recognize her seven years at the helm of the paper, which she ensured remained an independent, locally owned package of stories by creative contributors, delivered free to some 15,000 print and digital readers.

In her work, she’s consistently cut to what mattered, the meaning of the facts. It’s not been easy. Nationwide, about 2,000 newspapers have shut down since 2004, according to University of North Carolina’s School of Media and Journalism. Too many of the rest have been gobbled up by predatory hedge funds or chains that eye newspapers as properties vulnerable to sales of assets from real estate to the means of production, plus senseless layoffs: Journalism jobs fell by more than 26% since 2008.

The First Amendment isn’t a perk for the press; it’s a fundamental, foundational right of all Americans. But losing 20% of newspapers reduced everyone’s access to information about local issues and government, making freedom of the press almost immaterial.

Communicating information is most helpful when it prompts people to act, defend others, hold the powerful accountable, and give voice to the voiceless. As playwright Arthur Miller said in 1961, “A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself,” and that’s true if it’s a monthly and it’s Central Illinois.

Clare also is a reporter and a writer – demanding different skills than editing. She’s tracked down facts, polished drafts, cooperated with diverse communities, dealt with 19 co-owners, and balanced opinions as different as Roger Monroe’s and mine. (We’ve had disagreements, but we always accepted the possibilities and limits of our roles and found common ground.) Throughout, she’s deftly danced through her duties, a delicate and determined talent somewhere between sculpting marble and herding cats.

Of course, the journey’s featured contents by clergy and the League of Women Voters, Mike Miller, Daniel McCloud, William Rau and Sherry Cannon, and long-time neighborhood scribes Sharon McBride and Sandra Dempsey Post, etc.; sponsors and advertisers large and small, monthly or occasionally; and outlets from groceries and waiting rooms to libraries and other public spaces (plus, not to forget the dozens of subscribers who paid to ensure mailed delivery.)

Through it all, serving the public is the rock rising above advocating or pandering, but feedback can be negative – largely because social media changed us to expect what we want, not what we need. If a story happens to echo someone’s perspective, why compliment? If it’s unexpected (news), look out. But gratitude happens, like a pleasant scent from an overgrown garden. Praise for the paper and for Clare has come from Republicans and socialists, Muslims and Jews, environmentalists and unionists, artists and advocates – for women’s rights, Black lives, Nature, voting rights, and everyday people who do good work and remain valuable neighbors.

With drive and heart, Clare’s made information meaningful to readers and the area.

Finally – if she doesn’t edit it – a sincere “thank you” to Clare Howard, journalist.