Media in Carrollton, Texas

Overview

Carrollton is a mid-sized suburb located in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area in north Texas. With a population of over 130,000 residents, Carrollton has a vibrant and diverse local media landscape.

This guide will provide an overview of the major media outlets, publications, radio stations, and online news sources covering Carrollton and the surrounding area.

Newspapers

Carrollton Leader

The Carrollton Leader is the main newspaper providing news coverage specifically for the city of Carrollton and nearby communities.

It has been in publication for over 40 years, starting as a weekly newspaper before expanding to twice-weekly publication on Wednesdays and Sundays.

The Carrollton Leader focuses primarily on local news, events, business openings, government and policy changes, and high school sports.

It has a reporting staff dedicated to covering the Carrollton area and gets most of its content from these local reporters and journalists. This gives it an advantage over larger metro papers in covering granular, street-level news happening in the community.

The Leader is owned by Community Impact Newspaper, which also publishes similar hyperlocal newspapers throughout the DFW metro targeting individual suburbs.

Dallas Morning News

As the premier daily newspaper in Dallas, the Dallas Morning News also provides occasional coverage of news and events happening in Carrollton and other northern suburbs. However, the city of Carrollton is not one of the Morning News’ primary coverage areas.

Stories focusing on Carrollton often relate to larger trends or issues impacting the whole northern Dallas suburban region.

So while it’s an invaluable source for major Dallas area news, the Morning News is not the best outlet for learning hyperlocal community information exclusive to Carrollton itself. Residents looking for this will be better turning to the Carrollton Leader instead.

Radio

KCBI 90.9 FM

KCBI 90.9 FM is a popular contemporary Christian music radio station broadcasting throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth area, including Carrollton. The station has been operating since 1971 with the goal of providing family-friendly Christian programming.

In addition to music, KCBI 90.9 FM airs programs with pastors from local Dallas churches, bible teachings, and commentary programs with a Christian perspective on current events and issues.

Given the large population of evangelical Christians in Carrollton and Texas as a whole, KCBI 90.9 FM enjoys a sizable listenership in the city and surrounding suburbs.

KMVK 107.5 FM La Grande

KMVK 107.5 FM La Grande is one of the most popular Spanish-language radio stations in the Dallas metro.

Broadcasting a format of hit contemporary Latin pop music, it has a large following particularly among the Hispanic community in Carrollton and other North Dallas suburbs. Its popularity reflects the sizable and growing Hispanic demographic across suburban North Texas.

In addition to music, KMVK 107.5 FM airs Latin pop culture news, entertainment updates, contests, and specialty community programming aimed at local Hispanic listeners in the Metroplex.

It provides an invaluable Spanish-language media outlet for information and connection to Carrollton’s Hispanic community.

Digital Media & News Sites

City of Carrollton Website & Social Channels

The official website for the city of Carrollton at www.cityofcarrollton.com provides information directly from the city’s government.

Residents can learn about upcoming city council meetings, changes to city ordinances, garbage pickup schedules, permits, and any other city policies or departments.

The city website and its associated official social media accounts, including on Facebook and Twitter, make up the direct information channels between municipal government operations and Carrollton locals.

Checking these sources ensures residents stay informed on a granular level on key issues impacting daily life in their city.

Carrollton Connect Community Blog

Carrollton Connect is a local blog providing independent news, photos, opinion articles, event announcements, and discuss for community issues impacting Carrollton.

Started and run by a husband and wife duo who are Carrollton residents, the blog provides an unique grassroots take on hyperlocal happenings in town told through the lens of locals living the events themselves.

While not an official news source, Carrollton Connect provides valuable supplemental coverage and commentary on granular, neighborhood-level information on new businesses, infrastructure projects, quality of life issues, events, culture changes, demographic shifts, and more in Carrollton from the POV of residents actually experiencing them directly.

For those looking to get the “word on the street” from average Carrolltonians on developments in their neighborhoods, Carrollton Connect serves as this bridge.

Magazines & Specialty Publications

214 Magazine

214 Magazine is a glossy lifestyle magazine published 10 times annually and distributed throughout the affluent Park Cities suburb of Dallas, including neighborhoods and areas in east central Carrollton.

The magazine provides luxury lifestyle content focused on high-end shopping/dining establishment openings, profiles on CEOs and celebrities living in the Park Cities region, luxury real estate listings, and coverage of charity galas, society events, and cultural happenings at the museums and fine arts organizations in North Dallas.

While focused primarily outside Carrollton to the east, there is minor 214 Magazine coverage towards the more affluent pockets of east central Carrollton nearby the Park Cities/North Dallas region.

For Carrollton locals living or working in these wealthier east central enclaves, 214 Magazine provides relevant luxury lifestyle news and happenings in the metro. However, those in other regions of Carrollton will find little utility in such niche upscale content tailored to the “Park Cities elite”.

Carrollton Monthly

Carrollton Monthly is a free community magazine mailed directly to thousands of homes in Carrollton providing wider lifestyle, culture, and general interest content for a mainstream local readership.

Published 6 times annually, each edition includes an events calendar with local happenings, restaurant reviews, human interest stories spotlighting inspiring Carrollton locals, real estate listings in the area, and directories on local schools or doctors offices.

With practical and wide-ranging editorial tailored specifically for the average Carrollton household, Carrollton Monthly has enjoyed a loyal local readership stretching back to its founding in the mid-1990s. It remains one of the more widely read publications providing general lifestyle coverage of the area.

Online Groups & Forums

Nextdoor – Carrollton

Nextdoor is a popular private social networking platform allowing residents of Carrollton to communicate with their neighbors living nearby. Neighborhoods and areas within the city have their own unique Nextdoor group that a resident in that locality can join (with verification of address).

Members can then post news, events, classifieds, recommendations, alerts about crime/safety issues, and more to just their local peers.

Nextdoor Carrollton serves as a micro-community platform for amplifying hyperlocal granular news down to the neighborhood block level.

For residents, it provides unparalleled real-time info on issues or happenings specifically impacting their own community group clustered around their home.

The platform’s verification requirements ensure only authentic residents join and communicate within that micro-locale.

Facebook Groups

There are dozens of active Facebook Groups centered around the city of Carrollton, each focused on specific interests, neighborhoods, demographics, and topics. Popular groups include:

• Carrollton Moms Group: 5,000 member community group for mothers in Carrollton to discuss child-raising, kid activities, family issues, etc.
• CarrolltonTX Home Sales: Smaller tight-knit group for Carrollton residents to list homes for sale in the area. Rules enforce members must live in the immediate area.
• Carrollton Foodies: Group of over 1,000 Carrollton locals reviewing and discussing the metro’s dining scene, with a special focus on local gems within the city itself.
• Carrollton Help Group: General community group for asking questions or recommendations about life in the city, as well as classifieds listings for jobs, items for sale, handymen services ads, and more.

These open Carrollton-centric groups provide community message boards for engagement between residents around topics relating specifically to their city.

Special interest groups unite Carrollton locals around niche issues while general help groups provide platforms for general discussion on all things directly impacting day-to-day life within the area.

Conclusion

From the long-running local Carrollton Leader newspaper to Spanish radio stations like La Grande 107.5 to Nextdoor digital groups at the neighborhood level, Carrollton benefits from a rich tapestry of media at various scopes and scales.

Navigating this landscape allows one to tap into both mass communication outlets and micro-community platforms – each providing value in informing residents’ collective understanding of their city and also enabling hyperlocal peer-to-peer transmission of granular information between average community members in their everyday lives.

A diversity of perspectives ultimately empowers citizens and makes for a more vibrant, interconnected Carrollton across all its many localized districts.