By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews
As I said last week, while there’s never really any deadline for donations YachatsNews is wrapping up its fall fundraising campaign this week in an effort to encourage more small, monthly subscribers to help support its work.
As of Thursday, 30 more people have signed up to donate a total of $285 more a month toward our operating expenses – which totals $3,420 over a year’s time. They join the 55 supporters who had been doing that previously. Another 42 people have opted to make one-time contributions totaling nearly $3,700.
We’d like to finish up the campaign strong by the weekend. The link to donate is here.
A local donor and his employer are matching contributions for a year up to $10,000. That means they are now approaching the $7,000 mark in their match – so there’s still room and time to trigger their full matching donation.
Your tax deductible donations are used to help defray our operating expenses, which are about $7,500 a month. That goes for everything from our reporter’s salary and benefits, pay to freelancers who help with stories, keep our web guy happy, and for the dozens of other small but important expenses it takes to keep this operation functioning.
YachatsNews is also trying to raise enough money to hire a second reporter to be based in Newport to better cover Lincoln County government, schools and education, the city of Newport, the bustling port and its related institutions, and the best story of the week in that area.
Here is a just a small sample of the stories the past two weeks that YachatsNews’ reporters provided readers for free – and that no other media in Lincoln County is doing:
- A full slate of election stories ranging from a hotly contested race for Lincoln County commissioner to two fire district levy requests to the Waldport mayoral contest, plus a look at the Oregon Senate District 5 race that covers all of Lincoln County. Unfortunately, what we did not have the capacity to do were stories on similar local races in Newport and Lincoln City.
- A deep “explainer” at how more than 35,000 Lincoln County general election ballots will be counted and a reminder Friday — with updates Monday and Tuesday — how to deal with your ballot before Tuesday’s 8 p.m. deadline;
- Stories on a judge’s ruling in three-year-old land-use dispute between a Yachats businesswoman and the county, or how the fire department in Yachats and its affiliated ambulance service are being sued for $6 million in a January fatal accident;
- The launch in November of winter shelter programs for the homeless in Yachats, Newport and Lincoln City, how many they serve, how much they cost and how they are financed.
- And, “good news” stories on a $1.5 million project to rehabilitate salmon streams in the Alsea River basin, stories on Halloween activities, mushroom festivals, small-town pharmacists and entertainment news from our media partner Oregon Coast TODAY.
One new donor this week sent along this message “We need more news about our coastal community like what you are producing. I hope you can continue to grow and thrive.”
We hope to as well.
We do this work because we value local information and how it can improve civic engagement and help communities – especially during a time when the media landscape is shrinking drastically.
This week the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University released its annual “State of Local News” report that said newspapers in the United States closed at the rate of more than two per week during 2023.
But it also noted there was a burst of growth among digital entrepreneurs “illustrating some tiny shoots of growth in what has become a desert-like climate for local news,” The Associated Press reported.
A total of 127 newspapers closed last year, while the 81 digital sites gained was the most in any year since Medill began measuring that activity in 2018.
“It shows that there are some entrepreneurs and innovators out there,” said Tim Franklin, director of the Medill Local News Initiative.
YachatsNews is one of those.
So we continue to ask for your help to allow us to do more and better, if you can afford to pitch in. If you have already contributed this year, we thank you.
As October draws to a close, consider signing up through PayPal to make a small, monthly donation so we can use the full match from your year-long amount from that donor and his employer.
Other ways to help
There are other ways to contribute if doing so by a small, monthly donation does not fit your charitable giving plan. You can:
- Write a check and drop it into the mail to YachatsNews, P.O Box 284, Yachats, Ore., 97498;
- Use the “Donate” button on the website to make a one-time contribution through PayPal;
- Advertise your business or organization on the site. Not only will you gain the additional exposure that 140,000 page views a month can bring, but you will be helping sustain this operation. Here is a link to rates and how to get that process started.
If, as always, there are questions please feel free to reach out to me by email at YachatsNews@gmail.com or simply call me at 503-970-3867.
The staff and board at YachatsNews appreciates your support.