Outlet profile

The Coastland Times (Opinion)

U.S. local/regional, mixed (Outer Banks, N.C.)

Owned byOuter Banks Newsmedia, LLC, a North Carolina affiliate of Boone Newspapers, Inc., a family-controlled community newspaper chain based in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. It bought the paper in December 2017 from the Meekins family's Times Printing Co.

FundingMainly local print and digital advertising, legal and public notices, and paid subscriptions. It also gets revenue from the Boone Newspapers chain structure. It has no known state or party funding.

On the administrationmixed

Background

The paper began as the Dare County Times, founded in Manteo on July 5, 1935 by Daniel Victor Meekins and his wife Catherine. It was renamed The Coastland Times in 1947. In 1949 Meekins merged several other coastal North Carolina papers he owned into it. The Meekins family ran it for more than 80 years, with later family members including Warren Meekins and Susan Simpson publishing it. In December 2017 it was sold to Outer Banks Newsmedia, LLC, a new affiliate of Boone Newspapers, Inc., which announced the purchase in January 2018. Its coverage is hyperlocal, focused on Dare County government, tourism, weather, coastal erosion and development. The opinion pages carry local columns and letters from varied viewpoints, plus some syndicated commentary. I did not find a published, documented analysis of its editorial leanings. The rating of its current stance toward the Trump administration is therefore a tentative judgment from a limited look at recent commentary, which included both pro- and critical-sounding pieces. I found no widely reported controversies about the paper.

Sources

Profile compiled 2026-11-04; refreshed when ownership, funding, or the administration changes.

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