Broken local news

Doc Searls observed, "When the going gets tough, the tough use radio." He tells the hopeful tale  of how Vermont Public Radio (VPR) news has jumped into the -- and delivered important news about the floods that washed out the center of the Green Mountain State. VPR can do its job well because a) it wants to and b) it has repeater stations that cover the entire state. (AM radio, our traditional resource in emergencies, doesn't work as well among the granite hills.)
Folks in Worcester recall how well WTAG performed during the 2008 ice storm.. The oldest AM station in central Massachusetts, WTAG can reach all of Worcester County, even after dark when it has to reduce its power. (WCRN has a stronger signal, but it is aimed eastward and so is good if you need to listen to Michael Savage you're driving on 128.)
So, we turn to WTAG for local news this morning and hear the announcer pronounce Woburn as Woe-burn. The only Worcester-area story comes from the Telegram and Gazette. The rest might as well have come from Google News. We do get local traffic and train information. And then we get Jim Polito's screed about James Hoffa's remarks last weekend.
I spoke with Searls last night and heard more how he followed the Irene coverage and the Santa Barbara fires a few years ago. Local broadcast news (radio and television) is a decidedly mixed plate. Radio stations, with few exceptions, are pretty much relegated to rebroadcasts of national programs. Local television can still put reporters in the field and do so well. Searls noted that WTKR in Norfolk VA was one of the few stations to provide streaming.
At last year's Southern England Weather Conference, Bryan Norcross, President/CEO of America’s Emergency Network, spoke (PowerPoint presentation) about the risk factors facing emergency communications:

• There are fewer news stations and they have smaller staffs
• TV station personnel are untrained in emergencies, in general
• Technical restriction limit message details (small counties  lose out)
• Broadcasters fill perceived gaps in message, sometimes with wrong info

In a complex calculus, technological advances, FCC policy changes, economic pressures, and our own preferences for happy talk on television and  wingnuts on the radio, our local news has been replaced with high-fructose corn syrup substitute - sweet, flavorful, and without nutrients.