Birmingham City Council have published a report into the content management system that was investigated by Help Me Investigate users last year andgenerated a number of news reports. More on the blog here.

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You can read Ben Harrow's write-up of this investigation on the Help Me Investigate blog.

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Sarah Hartley has written a roundup of the findings so far in the investigation into council coverage in local newspapers.She writes:"Sadly, the results so far don’t show a very healthy situation at those newspapers which have been analysed, with many seemingly pushing out local authority press releases or inserting the ‘usual suspect’ councillor quotes into stories which originate elsewhere."Not all of the 31 people who’ve signed up to take part in this project have come...

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More local newspapers have been covered in the investigation into local council coverage.The Wilts & Glos Standardhas a quarter of news pages referring to council affairs although "some of the references are brief; or an addition to an existing story; or to satisfy the need for a quick quote. There is little evidence, as far as I can see, of monitoring council meetings or writing more in-depth pieces about local politics.""Some of these stories seem to...

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Three more local newspapers have been covered as part of the investigation into local council coverage.The Witney Gazette sees 2.5 of its 20 pages of news devoted to council affairs in the local and surrounding council authorities;The Banbury Cake sees 1.25 of its 13 pages of news devoted to council affairs - although the dominance of advertising means there are actually only the equivalent of around 4.5 news pages when that is taken into account.The...

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Ed Walker has been looking at council coverage in the Lancashire Evening Post as part of the investigation into 'How much local council coverage is there in your local paper?' He writes: "I found that there were 35 pages devoted to news on 23/11, 25/11 and 27/11 and of these 6.25 pages were given over to ‘council reporting’. "Like others I’ve been finding there is little reporting of council meetings, more stories are created from council press...

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Journopig has added analysis of The Oxford Times to the investigation into 'How much local council coverage is there in your local paper?'26 of the newspaper's 184 pages are devoted to news, and of those: "We counted the equivalent of just three pages of council stories within this 26 page total, using Sarah’s guide to counting up coverage; but we were being generous by including brief mentions of, or quotes by, councils or councillors. "We...

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The investigation into How much local council coverage is there in your local newspaper? now has a handy spreadsheet, thanks to Chie Elliott.The spreadsheet - available here - will calculate the percentage of any newspaper's coverage that is based on monitoring the local council. Chie writes:"I have set it up so that every time anyone edits anything I’ll be notified. If you accidentally delete anything, don’t panic. You can either go to Edit and click Undo or, if...

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The investigation into 'How much local council coverage is there in your local newspaper?' has had its first results. OrangeBlossomer has blogged about her four-week survey of the weekly Sussex Express and daily Argus in Brighton:The two papers returned very similar results. In four weeks,Sussex Express produced an average of 4.15% of council news in its news pages and The Argus, an average of 4.46% over five days.Join the investigation here and read Chie's blog post here.

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The investigation into How much Birmingham City Council spends each year on compensating drivers of cars damaged by potholes/speed bumps has unearthed more information. Sarah has now also received figures on "how much the council spends on emergency repairs to roads, as opposed to planned upgrades/maintenance."Her update gives the following figures by financial year – 2004/05 to 2008/09  2004/05 £9,349,000  2005/06 £9,474,000  2006/07 £8,482,000  2007/08 £9,404,000  2008/09 £12,461,000 

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