Feedback: August 21, 2026

Don’t Shoot the Messenger

Dear Editor,

Add my vote to Mr. Cheeseman’s [“Come Clean on Calendar,” Feedback, Aug. 14]. Print the address and at least the date/time of the event. I see you have managed to continue printing the addresses for restaurant reviews. I have read your paper version, and I am unlikely to prioritize going online to research whether something is happening when and where I am available. I just don’t go.

I do now realize my ire over this has been spilling over onto innocent venues/events/etc., since I associate them with your no-info policy, and assume they do not want my business/attendance. Unintended consequences. 

Who, what, when, where, please!

Regards,

Laura Boas

Simplicity’s Sake

Dear Editor,

I love that you’re not using the staples anymore. I like to repurpose the Chronicle when I’m done and use it in the litter box, clean windows, etc. When you used staples it was a pain to take it apart. It’s just simpler this way! Thanks!

Kimberly Haley

Back to the Fifties

Dear Editor,

I’m commenting on Richard Cherwitz’s letter about UT [“Strategy to Save UT,” Feedback, Aug. 14]. I agree that the changes by UT’s president and provost are tantamount to a coup. Even though I am fully aware of the Republicans’ right-wing agenda, especially here in Texas, I can’t help feeling a sense of despair about the changes by conservative groups and lawmakers to eliminate courses related to diversity and race. This plot reminds me of the Eurocentric curriculum of my 12 years in the Austin school system of the Fifties and Sixties! It wasn’t until I took Mexican American classes and became involved with the Chicano organization at UT that I started to learn our true history hence becoming politicized and empowered. I agree with Cherwitz that a Democrat governor and Legislature can change the conservative political agenda which in my opinion is sending us back to the racist 1950s.

Anita Quintanilla

Free Press Forever

Dear Editor,

There is something easy to forget about a free press: Most of the time, its work does not feel dramatic.

It looks like a reporter sitting through a City Council meeting, asking one more question when an official would rather move on, digging through public records, checking facts, and following decisions most of us do not have time to track.

That work matters.

Especially in a city like Austin, where change can happen so quickly that entire neighborhoods can feel different almost overnight. I have watched Austin change enough to know that when nobody is paying attention, decisions can reshape a community before the people living there understand what happened.

People deserve to know who makes decisions, who benefits, who is left out, and what happens with public money.

I do not believe every journalist gets every story right. Newspapers make mistakes. Reporters can miss context. Opinion pages can publish things that make us angry. I have read plenty that I disagreed with.

But disagreement is not a reason to weaken the press. It is one reason we need it.

A free press gives residents a chance to challenge government, question institutions, tell stories that might otherwise be ignored, and put uncomfortable truths in front of people who would rather not see them.

Local journalism may matter most. When nobody is watching City Hall, school boards, police departments, developers, or other powerful institutions, the public loses more than a newspaper story. We lose another set of eyes on the people making decisions about where we live.

The press should be challenged. It should be held accountable. It should also remain free enough to challenge everybody else.

Freedom of the press has never only been about protecting reporters.

It protects the rest of us.

Without it, we simply know less.

Michael A. Davis