Dear Readers:
The Valley Independent Sentinel is one of the local agencies benefiting from “The Great Give 2012,” a regional effort to raise money for non-profit groups.
The 36-hour event, organized by The Community Foundation for Greater New Haven, kicked off at 8 a.m.
We could really use your help.
In order to keep a truly local news site alive, we humbly ask you to use “The Great Give“ donate to the Online Journalism Project, the non-profit entity that works tirelessly to collect donations and grants to keep us going.
We know that isn’t an easy request. We know times are very tough.
However, if each of our 4,879 Facebook readers gave just $25, that would give us $121,959 — or 70 percent of our annual budget.
If enough readers donate, will can qualify for a number of matching grants being offered by the foundations sponsoring The Great Give.
Click here to donate to the Online Journalism Project.
We also know that donating to a news organization may seem like an odd request. But, in 2012, with the massive changes that have decimated the newspaper industry, we feel community support is a crucial way to keep community news going.
Information about the Online Journalism Project — a trailblazing, well-respected organization within the journalism industry (heck, a college professor spent several years writing a book about it) — can be found on its donation page within The Great Give 2012.
For ore information on the Online Journalism Project, including tax returns, click here.
We launched in June 2009 thanks to a $500,000 two-year grant awarded by the Knight Foundation.
That money was used to pay salaries and benefits, rent on our Ansonia office, freelance writers, and for run-of-the-mill journalism expenses such as copies of lawsuits and arrest reports.
Three years and four months later, we’re still here, amazingly, thanks to donations from foundations and readers.
Since going live in 2009, we’ve published thousands of stories, ranging from car wrecks to long-term investigations.
We’ve received 15 awards from the Connecticut Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, five of which were for stories written within the first six months of our launch.
We’d like to keep it going. We want to keep the Valley informed and connected.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Click here to donate.
As always, thank you for reading.
Eugene Driscoll and Ethan Fry
ValleyIndy.org
203 446 2335
