Local News Day: Comments from our founding editor, Michael McGinnis
Rockton-Roscoe News began five years ago with no expectation of what it would become.
The inaugural Local News Day on April 9 is a nationwide effort to remind people that what happens in their own communities matters, and that someone has to be there to cover it.
So I reached out to Rockton-Roscoe News founding editor Michael McGinnis to talk about how the outlet started, exactly five years ago.
Something I’ve always found interesting is that Michael didn’t set out to build a news team. What he started was something that most of us found, believed in, and chose to be part of.
What follows is a look back in his own words. On how it all came together, what’s changed over the years, and why local news matters.
On what led to the start of Rockton-Roscoe News
Getting fired from my previous job. They hired me to do elite customer service, which I’m pretty good at, but the assignment had turned into routine account maintenance, which I’m pretty bad at. After I lost my job, I noticed that many available communications positions wanted me to have local journalism experience. Well, after college, I had been an assistant magazine editor (very small magazine). And I had worked for years in public relations, communications, and marketing. But I hadn’t had any local journalism experience. What to do? Well, as a web developer, I had no fear of starting a website. And as a writer and publicist for most of my life, I had no fear of coming up with content.
I discovered that Patch Labs would allow me to create a local news outlet with no upfront cost in return for 10% of the revenue. So that’s what I did, just to put it on my résumé. Since I lived in Roscoe, I called it Roscoe News. I started with a few calendar items, a story about garlic mustard, a cat photo, and a dachshund event. But a week or so later I got a call from New York City, from the president of Patch Labs, who convinced me that maybe I should take this seriously.
On what was happening in local media
Even decades ago, when I worked for a public relations agency in the 90s, I knew that local news was suffering badly. One day I realized that every story that day, in both local newspapers, had originated with a public relations guy like myself. In other words, I could already tell there weren’t enough reporters to cover everything that was happening, or to verify whatever the public relations people were feeding them. It’s even worse now. We have 80% fewer journalists than we had in 2005. And in the past decade or so, more than 35% of the local newspapers in Illinois have closed. Sure, you still find all kinds of information on social media - but nobody has the job anymore of making sure it’s true. So this is not business as usual. We have lost something important.
When I started Rockton-Roscoe News, I didn’t realize that some newspapers in Winnebago County have only one local reporter. One Rockford weekly, which had been distinguished for its reporting, now has no reporters at all. In fact, I believe we’re the only news outlet in the county that’s still locally-owned. (Though one of my favorites, Rock River Current, does as good a job as if it were locally owned.) Across America, many century-old newspapers are but a shadow of their former selves. And now, with AI and similar technologies, bad actors can create entire networks of newspapers with fictitious bylines, pretending to be real newspapers with real journalists.
On the early days of Rockton-Roscoe News
I remember the first Village of Roscoe meeting that I attended, in April 2021. I was the only person there who wasn’t a trustee or a staff member. I was the only person in the audience. So I was pretty noticeable. By the way, this is typical for municipal meetings - our reporters are often the only person in the audience. Afterwards the village administrator, Scott Sanders, with a quizzical look on his face, asked me who I was. I sheepishly told him I was the “editor of Roscoe News,” which was the first time I had said that. To his credit he politely said that he didn’t think he had ever heard of Roscoe News.
I hastened to explain that it was only a week or two old and that it only had about 10 readers so far. Shortly after that, a controversy exploded about a proposed wedding venue off White School Road. We were the only news outlet to cover it in depth and later I was so excited to see that 100 people had read the story. Five years later, our stories often have more than 1,000 readers, even tens of thousands.
On the role of hyperlocal reporting in our community
We don’t and can’t cover everything. But with many issues that we cover, we are the only news outlet to cover them. In many cases, residents would never know what their local governments are doing if we didn’t show up. Sure, sometimes Rockford media covers a Rockton, Roscoe, and South Beloit story. But it makes a difference that our reporters care about their community because they live here themselves.
One example of what the world would be like without us: a Rockford TV station once heard that there might be a zoning controversy in Roscoe, so they sent a reporter to a Roscoe Village meeting. He stayed for about ten minutes, then packed up his tripod and headed back to the studio. That night, they broadcast part of a resident’s comment. Except the resident had gone on to say exactly the opposite of the part they put on the news. Boy, he was mad.
On what gives him hope for local journalism’s future
The tools that we use to make our journalism affordable, the Internet in particular, makes it possible for anyone who cares about a community to create and publish news. What makes me most hopeful is that here we have reporters who do care about our community, people who want to dig into issues that concern their neighbors and keep digging until they find the answers. That’s not something that established news outlets can spend their time and money doing. In fact, our community passion means that we actually have more local reporters than many traditional media outlets do, even though ours are part time or unpaid. And our stories tend to be much more in-depth.
On advice for starting a news outlet
Well, it’s not a get rich quick scheme. There’s a reason why news outlets are going out of business or becoming zombie publications. It’s got to be a labor of love, with community support. We wouldn’t have been able to do what we’ve done without people who know the community and care about it.
Entrepreneurs have a term - minimum viable product - which means “don’t get in debt before you know what your customers want.” Financially this attitude means that we have had to get our job done without frills. I started Rockton-Roscoe News with no financial investment except $15 to register the domain name. If I had waited till I could afford weekly printing bills, I never would have been able to get started.
On what readers should understand about why local news matters
Few readers know that, with the changing media landscape, advertising is no longer enough to keep most local news outlets in business. I mean, Craigslist killed their classified ad revenue stream a long time ago. They won’t tell you this, but most print weeklies barely stay in business and only because of revenue from paid legal notices, which we can’t get. Even the Beloit Daily News started asking for donations.
Times have changed. Facebook is free, right? Of course, one problem with Facebook is that it doesn’t give businesses what they think it’s giving them. Facebook is always suggesting that I could get 1,000 more views from people who don’t live here, if I paid to promote a post that has already received 5,000 views. But I digress.
But I think people are catching on. They’re seeing that even if the Internet is free, producing northern Illinois news on the Internet isn’t free. So our number of paid supporters is increasing - but not as fast as if people really understood the situation. That in many cases, we are the only independent, unbiased local news source that’s actually accountable to Rockton, Roscoe, and South Beloit residents, instead of to out-of-state owners.
Our members graciously donate to help keep the news free for everyone. Please help support independent, unbiased local news in South Beloit, Rockton, and Roscoe.
On what’s next for him
I have confidence in passing the editorial baton to our new editors, Harold Bone and Alycia Dioneda Schneedle, and to our other reporters. I'm delighted by their passion, skill, and insight, and I know our communities will be well served by them. I hope I've done a good job at serving our communities too, but it hasn't come easily for me. Often people are dumbfounded when they find out how different I am from most people. ("Partly Amish" describes me partly.) One time when I told a Roscoe friend something that I firmly believed, he blurted out, "No you don't!" I hope I've done a good job of serving our communities anyway.
As far as my next steps, I haven’t talked much about them because I'm not sure about them myself. But as I move toward retirement, I hope to find time to write more novels.
Alycia Dioneda Schneedle
Alycia Dioneda Schneedle
Rockton-Roscoe News has earned recognition at both the state and regional level. In 2025, we received four Illinois Press Association awards, including first place in News Reporting (Series) and second place in Investigative/Enterprise Reporting for work by Michael McGinnis, second place in News Reporting (Single Story) for reporting by Alycia Dioneda Schneedle, and third place in Feature Writing (Personality Profile) for a story by Jean Seegers.
Rockton-Roscoe News has also been recognized by the Northern Illinois News Association, earning third place for General Excellence (Website) in both 2024 and 2025, along with additional 2025 awards for Best Watchdog Reporting (Michael McGinnis) and Government/Public Affairs Reporting (Marianne Mueller).
Recently, Rockton-Roscoe News was honored with a Stately Award for Creative Media and Marketing from the Stateline Chamber of Commerce in March 2026.
Michael McGinnis
Alycia Dioneda Schneedle
Alycia Dioneda Schneedle
