DETROIT, MI — MLive, one of Michigan’s largest online news sources, has laid off two senior journalists who helped lead state coverage within the past month.
John Barnes, the statewide projects coordinator for MLive Media Group, was let go recently. “Yeah, my job was eliminated,” said Barnes in an email. “We did great work for a long time. I am pursuing other opportunities. I intend to stay in journalism. Gotta write, you know?” His last story was published Jan. 25.
Barnes’ departure comes less than a month after MLive eliminated its Capitol/Lansing news editor position, which had been held by Meegan Holland.
To fill part of the gap, Dustin Block, the editor of the Detroit hub, has been editing coverage in both cities, according to a source familiar with the situation. Lansing, the state capital, and Detroit, the biggest city, are considered part of MLive’s “expansion market,” because the news outlet is not affiliated with newspapers in those cities.
MLive.com is the online portal for Advance-owned newspapers in Michigan, including The Ann Arbor News, The Grand Rapids Press, and The Flint Journal; MLive also has its own editorial staff, under the parallel digital-print editorial structure Advance has established for its properties around the country. According to statistics from Alexa, the site draws slightly more traffic than the website for the Detroit Free Press.
John Hiner, MLive’s vice president for content, declined to comment on the moves or future coverage plans.
Barnes and Holland were both well-respected by their co-workers and competitors, and their departure was described by current and former colleagues as a loss for journalism in the state.
Barnes’ most recent public service reporting consisted of a series of features on wolves in Michigan. In a state where there is a hot debate about wolf hunting, the pieces got a lot of attention on social media. He also led a team of reporters on MLive’s 2011 series on juvenile lifers that won the “advancement of justice” award from the State Bar of Michigan; he continued to report on the story over the years.
Barnes and Holland also shared a first-place award from the Michigan Associated Press in 2012 for the best sustained coverage of a single news event, a wildfire on the state’s Upper Peninsula.
Anna Clark is a journalist in Detroit. Her writing has appeared in ELLE Magazine, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Next City, and other publications. Anna edited A Detroit Anthology, a Michigan Notable Book, and she was a 2017 Knight-Wallace journalism fellow at the University of Michigan. She is the author of The Poisoned City: Flint’s Water and the American Urban Tragedy, published by Metropolitan Books, an imprint of Henry Holt. She is online at www.annaclark.net and on Twitter @annaleighclark.