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Their franchise on Long Island rivaled any paper’s news monopoly on a major important geographic area.

Their award-winning journalism was recognized and awarded by the profession and Newsday made those lists of top 10 papers in the nation.

That was another era when newspapers were household words and bibles of information to middle class families.

The changing times and morphing media industry has resulted in both the creation of alternative news sources and an economic reality that arrived with new media that there is an ever-decreasing revenue stream to fund gathering and disseminating news.

The increasing role of larger media conglomerates have further eroded the newsroom as many of us have known it. Our industry is changing, and although we’re not certain where it will wind up, some of the changes are not good.

Whenever the financial investment in a newsroom is cut, the quality of the news received is jeopardized. The newsroom in this country has traditionally been funded by the print industry. And the true investigative stories and hard-hitting quality journalistic endeavors still exist in the traditional (print) newsroom.

So each time a small paper, large, mega-conglomerate or family-owned cuts newsroom funding to meet the realities of the changing industry and worldwide recession, our access to news is threatened. This should be of concern to all the freedom-loving people of the world.

The flow of reliable, quality independent news is essential to democracy. And friends, the best enterprise journalistic efforts haven’t existed on cable or broadcast media and we have little way to judge the reliability of what we get on the internet.

That was a long way to explain why after five years at the helm of the news operation of the once mighty Newsday, editor-in-chief John Mancini resigned last week. After 20 years at the paper, Mancini, who got his start in journalism at the Queens Tribune under legendary editor David Oats, bid a surprise teary-eyed goodbye to his staff.

Since the acquisition of the troubled Newsday by Cablevision, which also owns Madison Square Garden, the NY Knicks and Rangers, Mancini has clashed with the company’s owners over coverage of negative news about Knicks and over newsroom cuts. Almost a year ago, Mancini and other top editors walked out for a five day period.

According to published reports, the 49-year-old newsroom vet saluted his staff for getting through the rough times. “You’ve kept this place afloat and not only afloat but thriving . . .You do work that you have the right to be proud of everyday.”

John Mancini, still a resident of Maspeth, is certain to reappear on the journalism scene, but his courageous leadership of the Newsday newsroom during the past five turbulent years was indeed work he has the right to be proud of everyday.

John, stop by for a cup of coffee; we’d like some of our new reporters to meet one of the newsroom giants who learned journalism the right way.

We salute you.

Shortly after taking over at Newsday as editor and executive vice president Mancini contributed the following piece to our Special 35th Anniversary Edition of the Tribune reflecting on his experience in the Tribune newsroom.
By JOHN MANCINI

The early ‘80s in Queens. Call it the Era of Big Threats.

A subway strike? Maybe.

Cable TV may be coming to your block.

Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.

Leave the Trib office to do a story? Only if I can borrow your jacket.

Never before or since have I worked in place where so many of the people you wrote about actually showed up in the newsroom. The Gray Panthers? Fine, please have a seat, each of you. Please don’t step on the Cub Scout. Or that man with the giant squash. These were the people of the community.

It was less fulfilling to meet, repeatedly, the local businessman who wasted time trying to impress a young reporter on his qualifications to be awarded part of that looming cable franchise.

I say this because only later did we learn that a good number of the Queens Democrats who had cadged city jobs and spent their time trying to get the Trib to publicize their own supposed do-gooder exploits were in fact crooks.

It would be years before the Parking Violations Bureau scandal brought down the whole house, sending not only a few familiar DOT hacks to prison and the fallen Donald Manes to his grave. That local fellow who thought it would be worth his time for us to write him up in the Trib never had a chance. That’s what I know now.

Still, right away back then, I did see a few valuable things quite clearly, such as how deeply David Oats believed in the value of the community press. And any fool knew instantly that the newsroom could never be big enough for both Abraham V. George and Joseph W. Queen. But it took a sustained period of observation to appreciate the journalistic stylings of one Bob Manas, scourge of Kissena Boulevard.

In the end, what I recall most distinctly of that time in Queens is just how much I didn’t know.

MSchenkler@QueensTribune.com