I founded the New Hampshire Center for Public Interest Journalism to publish InDepthNH.org online because New Hampshire is in the midst of a news emergency, as is much of the country. If you don’t believe me, pick up your local newspaper or watch the local newscast. If you’re satisfied, then you probably don’t remember a decade ago when there were twice as many reporters working in New Hampshire in a competitive news environment with a hopping statehouse press room.
The jobs paid well enough to keep the best reporters working, and they helped train new reporters as they came along. There are few new reporters finding full-time work in New Hampshire anymore, and many of the experienced reporters who served as mentors have moved on through buyouts, layoffs and the need to make a better living.
InDepthNH.org plans to help turn that around because we augment the work of the fine news outlets, reporters and editors who are still hanging on during troubled times. Our business model is to give away our investigative and statehouse stories. Our mission is to increase reporting that is expensive and time-consuming and the first stories to be left behind when there are too few reporters at a news outlet to do them.
We have been working mostly as volunteers because we wanted to have a terrific website InDepthNH.org to show you just how good we are, what we have done and what we plan to do in the future. Now, it’s time for you to invest in our work. You will always know where your money is being spent. It’s time for you to help us not only earn a modest living, but more importantly to grow into New Hampshire’s premiere trusted news site. To cover the state properly over the next five years, we will hire five more reporters, two fundraisers, and a copy editor. We also need to pay a modest wage to the reporters, columnists, copy editors, cartoonist and others who work for the love of it right now.
The fundraiser NHGives on June 7, will kick off our five-year growth plan so you will hear us asking for your tax-deductible donations, underwriting and sponsorship like a broken NPR fundraising record now and in the months to come. But that’s because we operate as a nonprofit, building our future with your support, however you choose to give it. Share our important stories on Facebook if now is not a good time to donate cash. Our fundraising goal by June 7 is $50,000. Volunteer, whatever you can do to show you value unbiased, honest news, news that you won’t find elsewhere and want to be part of making it happen in New Hampshire. The more you give, the more we can do for you.
I want to introduce you to all of the New Hampshire journalists who have already thrown their hearts and souls into New Hampshire Center for Public Interest Journalism.
Meet Nancy West, founder, with 30 years of experience at the New Hampshire Union Leader after starting out at The Littleton Courier. More recently, she taught at the New England Center for Investigative Reporting at Boston University.
Roger Wood – the man with the golden voice — has 30 years of experience with WOKQ, NHPR and many other stations.
Mike Marland, has been the editorial cartoonist with the Concord Monitor for 29 years. He has thrown his support behind us, too.
Longtime statewide outdoor writer and North Country newspaper owner John Harrigan of Colebrook writes for us, too, in his View From Above the Notches. He has been working in various media, with a lot of radio and television but mostly newspapers, for 47 years and, as he says, “still counting.”
Conservation Biologist Christine Schadler, an author and educator, explores her passion for coyotes and wildlife and about people and animals sharing turf in the Granite State in her column Howling from the Mountain.
Sarah Freeman-Woolpert’s column Sarah’s View from the Borderland is about the Pembroke native’s unique perspective on the people and places she meets in her travels. She is currently spending 10 months in Bosnia and Herzegovina conducting research on youth activism and civic engagement.
Bob Charest was special sections editor at the New Hampshire Union Leader for 25 years. He was a newspaper editor for more than 33 years and a reporter and news correspondent for several more. He has a special interest in the needs of the less advantaged, and in addition to serving as a guardian ad litem through the CASA program for 14 years, he was a legal guardian for a developmentally disabled man and for the past 17 years has been a proud adoptive parent. He has also served as president of a watershed advocacy group for the past 10 years. He is a consultant to InDepthNH.org and assists in copy editing staff-generated material.
There are more of us behind the scenes who do what they can. Spend some time on our website InDepthNH.org today. We work for you so let us know how we are doing.
We thank you.
New Hampshire Center for Public Interest Journalism
InDepthNH.org, nonprofit investigative news website
Website: www.indepthnh.org
Email: nancywestnews@gmail.com
Twitter: @nancywestnews
Phone: 603-738-5635
