Finding and Submitting Obituaries in the Times News of Twin Falls
I have spent more time than I care to admit navigating the obituary process for people in Twin Falls and the surrounding Magic Valley. The Times News is the main paper, and it handles obituaries differently than the national outlets you might be used to. Here is how it actually works when you are dealing with it. The Times News publishes obituaries through a combination of their own editorial desk and third-party funeral home submissions. Most obituaries in Twin Falls come from funeral homes rather than being independently written by staff reporters. That means the process often goes through funeral directors, not directly through the newspaper office unless you are a family member working around a funeral home. If you are trying to find an obituary that was published, the Times News website at timesnews.com has an obituaries section. It is searchable by name and date. The online archive typically goes back about five to seven years, though some older pieces from the print era are digitized and indexed differently. If you cannot find something on the website, calling the Times News newsroom directly at 208-733-4141 and asking for the obituary desk can help. They can look up records that predate their online system or confirm whether a piece ran in a specific issue.
The Submission Process
When someone dies in Twin Falls, the funeral home handling arrangements usually takes the lead on writing and submitting the obituary. Families typically work through the funeral director, who drafts the notice based on information from the family and submits it to the Times News for publication. The funeral home often has established relationships with the newspaper's obituary editor, which speeds things up considerably. If you are a family member and you want to bypass the funeral home or submit directly, you can contact the Times News obituary desk. The standard deadline for same-day or next-day publication is usually mid-morning, often around 10 or 11 AM, but this varies. Calling ahead on the morning you want to submit is the safest approach. Weekend submissions tend to have longer turnaround times because the editorial staff is thinner. The cost structure matters here. A basic obituary in the Times News typically runs between $100 and $200 depending on length and whether it includes a photograph. Longer notices with multiple photos or detailed biographical sections can push toward $300 or more. Some funeral homes bundle the obituary cost into their overall service packages, which means families sometimes do not see the separate charge at all.
A Specific Problem I Dealt With
I once helped a family track down an obituary from 2016 for a relative who had died in Twin Falls but whose family had moved away. The online archive had the piece listed under a slightly different spelling of the last name because the funeral home had submitted it with a typo. The family had been searching for weeks without success. I ended up calling the Times News and asking them to check their print archives for that week's issue. They pulled the physical newspaper from storage, confirmed the misspelling, and sent the family a scanned copy. That kind of thing does not happen every day, but it shows why having a direct line to the newsroom is useful when the digital version fails you. Most people do not realize that the Times News obituary content is also syndicated. Notices published in the paper often appear on memorials.com and other obituary aggregation sites within a day or two. If you are searching and the Times News page has nothing, checking those third-party sites can sometimes surface a version that the newspaper's own search index does not show clearly. Another thing that catches people off guard: the death notice and the obituary are two different things in newspaper terminology. A death notice is a brief, factual announcement — name, age, date of death, surviving family. It is cheaper and shorter. An obituary is a fuller narrative with biography, life details, and often a photo. People sometimes request a death notice when they actually want an obituary, and then they are surprised by how little the final piece says about the person. If you want a meaningful piece that actually describes a life, make sure you are ordering an obituary, not just a death notice. The price difference is worth understanding before you commit.
Get the Full Details
Pitfalls and Limitations
The Times News circulation covers Twin Falls and parts of Jerome, Snake River, and Elmore County. If your family members live outside that area, the obituary may not reach them. For families with relatives in Boise, Salt Lake, or further away, I often recommend supplementing the Times News notice with a social media announcement or a platform like Legacy.com, where the piece will attract a wider audience. The newspaper obituary serves the local community and provides the formal record, but it is not a comprehensive distribution channel. Another limitation is the turnaround time during high-volume periods. After major incidents or during winter months when mortality rises, the obituary desk can get backed up. I have seen publication delayed by an extra day or two simply because there were too many submissions to process. If timing is critical for a service announcement, do not assume next-day guarantee applies without confirming it in writing over the phone. The digitization of older records is incomplete. Anything before roughly 2018 may exist only in print or on microfilm. The Times News, like most community papers, has not fully digitized its entire archive. If you need a copy of an older obituary and the person died before the digital transition, you may need to visit the Twin Falls public library or the Canyon County historical society to access the physical files. Expect to spend an afternoon on that if you go the archival route.
Practical Steps if You Need to Submit or Retrieve One Now
Call the Times News at 208-733-4141 and ask for the obituary desk. Have the full legal name of the deceased, the date of death, and any funeral home information ready. If you are submitting, confirm the deadline for the issue you want and ask about current pricing for the length of notice you need. If you are retrieving, have the approximate publication date and any alternate spellings of the name prepared. The staff is generally helpful but busy, so being organized upfront saves everyone time. For family members who want to preserve a copy, request a digital proof before publication if possible. The funeral home usually handles this, but if you are submitting directly, ask. Once it runs, take a screenshot or save the PDF from the website. Print copies degrade and digital links can rot over time. Keeping your own copy is practical and avoids the hassle of tracking something down years later. The obituaries in the Times News serve a real purpose in Twin Falls. They are the community record of who lived and died there, and they help people who are processing grief find a place to read about the person they lost. The system is not perfect and it has gaps, but knowing how it operates and where the friction points are makes the whole process considerably less stressful than it could be.
