If you listen to the national media, newspapers are dead. Of course if you listen long enough, you’ll believe it wise to pull all of your savings from banks and stash it in your mattress.

All the banks are failing, right? At least that’s the impression the national headlines give you.

Well, of course that’s a silly notion. The great majority of banks, including our local ones — especially our local ones — are in fact solid as a rock.

So are most newspapers — especially community newspapers.

A study of newspapers just released by researchers at the University of Missouri illustrates that with staggering data.

The research was completed this summer, prior to the economic turmoil and the most recent flare-ups in the presidential race.

The report shows that 86 percent of adults read a newspaper each week.

Nearly 60 percent of survey participants reported that their local newspaper was the primary source of news and information about their communities.

That number blew away the other options on the survey with TV ranking a distant second place with 11 percent, 9 percent said friends and relatives (who statistically would likely get their information from newspapers) and 6 percent said radio.

That’s great news for newspapers.

But ignoring the changing world would be foolish.

The world is changing and so are newspapers. Across America newspapers big and small are trying to reinvent themselves a bit and get re-tooled for the future.

Although we have seen a slight loss of print readers through the years, comparing today’s readership to 1997 numbers — the year before we started our online site — shows a more than 20-percent increase in the audience we reach.

So the real reason for the urgency for change isn’t about a loss of readers; it’s about dollars and cents.

In the last 12 months, the cost of newsprint, our biggest single cost after personnel, has risen by more than 30 percent. Lots of other costs have gone up, too, just as many of you have felt in your own lives, households and businesses.

We’re still profitable, but less so than when we’ve been at peak of performance.

Beyond the internal economic pressures, tough times have hit the auto industry and the housing market, both of which have traditionally been strong newspaper advertisers.

Those businesses that can weather the economic pressures realize that fortunes are made in times of economic downturn. Massive market share can be gained from competitors through consistent advertising, especially through rough economic patches.

Here at the newspaper we are working to reduce internal expenses, including a plan to begin printing on slightly narrower newsprint in late November.

Plus we’re taking a hard look at expenses which are not core to what we do best — providing local news and information.

Despite the changes facing our industry, I’m massively optimistic about the future of newspapers, especially community ones like ours.

No one else can or will do what we do in our communities. We’re still working hard to be the best newspaper we can be for our community.

As we do that, please let us know what we can do to improve. Thanks for your readership and (in advance) your ideas.

Kevin Cooper is publisher of The Natchez Democrat. He can be reached at 601-445-3539 or kevin.cooper@natchezdemocrat.com.