A group of small newspapers in the Pacific Northwest is providing a detailed local examination of a decidedly global issue.

With the occasional series, "Our Climate is Changing ... Ready or Not," the newspapers owned by East Oregonian Publishing Co., of Pendleton, Ore., are also demonstrating how small newspapers can combine forces to provide in-depth coverage of a subject that might seem forbiddingly complex to many newspapers with limited resources.

The first part of the series began March 29 in The Daily Astorian, a five-day daily with a circulation of about 10,000 in Astoria, a city located on the northwestern coast of Oregon. More installments are planned.

The series came about because Steve Forrester, editor and publisher of The Daily Astorian identified climate change as "the most important challenge in the region in coming years," said Patrick Webb, the newspaper's managing editor and the project's coordinator.

In an introductory note to readers, Forrester said "climate change is the biggest, most significant challenge of the 21st century," and the series represents an "extraordinary commitment for a newspaper group of our size."

All told, seven reporters, three photographers and several editors worked on the initial stories, which took about a year to plan and execute, Webb said.

Besides the Astorian, other newspapers active in the effort include The East Oregonian, a seven-day daily with circulation of about 12,000 in the northeastern Oregon city of Pendleton, and four affiliated weeklies – the Chinook Observer of Long Beach, Washington; the Wallawa County Chieftain and Blue Mountain Eagle, located respectively in the eastern Oregon cities of Enterprise and John Day; and the Capital Press, a regional farm weekly based in Salem, Ore., and distributed in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and California.

Presentation of the stories in the project differs from paper to paper.

The two dailies ran the first stories as a three-day series – The East Oregonian starting on April 1 – but with somewhat different sequencing. The Chinook Observer used its entire front page to introduce the stories. The two weeklies in eastern Oregon have been publishing them as an occasional series. The Capital Press, with correspondents based across several western states, ran the initial material as a single package with some additional reporting.

Major stories have dealt with a changing global climate's potential impacts in the Northwest on two key economic sectors, fisheries and agriculture; the outlook for coastal communities if sea level rises according to some projections; and water-supply issues that would result from projected reductions in snowpack, because snowmelt accounts for up to 75 percent of the water in regional streams. Sidebars have included several interviews with area scientists.

Another story dealt with the scientific dialogue over human impacts on climate, portraying it not as a debate but as a growing consensus. The lead's first words, in a quotation from one scientist, were, "It's not a scientific debate." A few paragraphs later, the story reported that "the supporting facts are piling up," and ticked off major points of evidence that climate is changing in significant ways.

"We made it a conscious decision not to make it a debate over whether there is [human-influenced] global warming," Webb said. "We wanted a series that said there's evidence that something is happening – how is it going to affect our local lives?"

Editors Plead 'Guilty' on No Naysayers Criticism

The project is not intended as "advocacy journalism," but the chosen focus still proved to be controversial with some readers, he said.

"A lot of readers who reacted negatively said we didn't print the naysayers," he added. "We had to hold up our hands and say yes, we're guilty of that. That was our strategy, we went in that direction and I think it was the correct thing to do."

Asked to reflect on lessons the series might hold for other smaller news outlets, Webb noted the decision "to draw from the experience of other staff members, so it was not just one paper carrying the load."

Another key factor, he said, was the recognition that the newspapers in the group serve areas that are very different geographically, from the desert country of eastern Oregon to Astoria on the rainy Oregon coast.

"From a journalistic planning standpoint, it was not an easy task, but editors all bought into it in a good way, busting loose some of their staff to work on it," he added.

Still, "the usual difficulties" that occur in major projects were encountered, he said, such as some series items being delayed because spot-news demands arose.

The project will probably include at least two more "full-scale packages" like the one that was published as a three-day series by the two dailies, and then more stories will appear as an "occasional series" bearing the project logo, Webb said.

"For papers our size, that's a lot more manageable," he said.

The series is available at www.dailyastorian.com, through the "Climate Change" link on the left side of the homepage.