Newspapers have been making news in recent weeks, and none of it has been good.

Staff cuts are coming to The New York Times, The Boston Globe, San Jose Mercury News, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News and San Francisco Chronicle. Joe Strupp, who follows the newspaper industry for "Editor & Publisher" magazine, reports that more than 350 newsroom jobs will be lost at just those six papers. "And those are just the ones we've heard about in recent weeks. No telling what budget-slashing knife is being sharpened elsewhere in this Honey-We-Shrunk-the-Newsroom business, much of it in the name of greed or at least bottom-line paranoia," he wrote.

Cuts of that magnitude at newspapers of such prominence should concern civic-minded people everywhere. Journalists are under enormous pressure to help their owners maintain and even increase profitability through difficult economic times.

"In most of these cases, cuts are the answer not to low profits, but to less-than-acceptable profits," Strupp concluded. "For each of these newspapers — all owned by major media chains — making money has not been a problem. The question has been making 'enough money,' a subjective phrase if there ever was one. In most cases, enough money is what meets Wall Street expectations and projections, not an acceptable income from a business hit by tough times."

The newspaper industry has been stuck in an advertising recession since late 2000, and there are troubling signs that ad revenues are beset by forces more lasting than a continuing sluggish economy. The shift of advertising dollars to the Internet and the fragmentation of news audiences have the feel of permanence.

So, journalists are being asked to do ever more with fewer resources. They are expected to "reinvent" content to appeal to broader audiences, some with no real interest in news.

What is most at risk in this more-with-less equation is the local public-service journalism that only newspapers do. It is the day-to-day reporting on school boards, city councils and state legislatures. And it is the high-end reporting that holds people in power accountable, the stories that won't be told if newspapers don't tell them.

Many years ago I participated in a project of the Newspaper Association of America. A team of very good people, representing all aspects of the newspaper business, was asked to explore scenarios for the future of newspapers. We brainstormed many possibilities and crunched tons of numbers.

The result was always the same. Newspapers are a mature business, and all future scenarios represented erosion of their historic franchise. New opportunities wouldn't offer the same high profit margins owners had enjoyed for decades.

I felt that two clear choices emerged: Newspapers could slow the rate of economic decline for as long as possible, until ultimately they withered; or they could embrace the inevitability of declining margins and accelerate investment into new products and audiences.

Only the second course offered a means to financially sustain local journalism. The first scenario amounted to eating our seed corn, a term industry analyst John Morton used in a column about industry struggles.

"The newspaper industry is under siege," Morton wrote. "Circulation is down, coverage of households continues to decline, readership remains weak among young people, and advertisers increasingly are willing to try non-newspaper advertising vehicles. The worst thing any business can do when faced with so many negative trends is to cut back on the quality of product and level of service. But that is precisely what many newspapers today are doing.

"Indeed, strategically, a more compelling argument can be made for increasing rather than cutting expenses. Improving and expanding the newspaper product resists negative trends eroding the industry's fundamental strengths. Shrinking newspaper efforts — eating the seed corn — feeds the negative trends."

He wrote that in 1995, toward the end of what seemed at the time like a pretty tough recession. It was nothing compared to the past few years.

Journalists around the country aren't giving up, and readers shouldn't, either. But we must recognize that we — journalists and readers — are the ones most likely to speak for public-service journalism. If we don't, why should anyone else?

Journalists truly must reinvent themselves and their work. They must do new things that connect with new readers, especially younger readers. They must do old things in better ways. And they must recommit to the notion that a public journal is a public trust. We must constantly earn the attention, respect, trust and loyalty of our communities.

Readers can help the cause by demanding journalism that makes a difference.

Something special today

Not all public-service journalism involves investigating scandals. Some of it is just plain helpful information, such as today's "Seattle Times' College Guide 2005."

This is our third year of providing a section, which aims to help parents and students pick a college, get accepted, do well and pay the bills. The planning calendar is definitely going to be studied at my house.

Inside The Times appears in the Sunday Seattle Times. If you have a comment on news coverage, write to Michael R. Fancher, P.O. Box 70, Seattle, WA 98111, call 206-464-3310 or send e-mail to mfancher@seattletimes.com. More columns at www.seattletimes.com/columnists