Section 815 ILCS 412/5 - [Effective 1/1/2025] Findings(a) Illinois benefits from robust local news services that provide trusted and essential information to the community that limits corruption, encourages citizen participation, helps combat misinformation, and mitigates community and individual alienation.(b) Local news in Illinois and throughout the country is struggling with newspaper advertising dropping 82% nationally since 2000, contributing to a 57% drop in the number of reporters at newspapers and thousands of closures.(c) Local news outlets are trusted sources of information for communities throughout Illinois and advertising spending with these outlets carries a substantial benefit for the effective dissemination of important government information to the communities it serves.(d) Government initiatives to increase spending on local news advertising has been manifestly successful in both supporting local news outlets and improving the information diet of communities in several major cities.(e) Illinois can and will implement such an initiative while preserving the editorial independence of local news outlets selling advertising space under this Act, and recognizes that any diversion of advertising spending that has the effect or appearance of an attempt to influence the editorial content of a local news organization violates the federal and State guarantees of freedom of the press and freedom of speech.Added by P.A. 103-1021,§ 5, eff. 1/1/2025.