Winter Park Voice joins Institute for Nonprofit News
An important update from the editor
March 5, 2024
Dear Reader,
We have some exciting news to share: The Winter Park Voice is one of the newest members of the Institute for Nonprofit News, a growing association of more than 400 large and small (that’s us!) nonprofit, nonpartisan journalism organizations that are dedicated to public service.
You can read INN’s announcement that includes the Voice here.
Through this association, we hope to learn and share best practices to strengthen our mission of bringing you important news about city government and issues that affect the quality of life in Winter Park.
From big national names like PBS News Hour, Politfact and Propublica to smaller Florida outlets like Oviedo Community News, the Florida Bulldog and the Key Biscayne Independent, INN says, “members of the INN Network tell stories that otherwise would go untold – connecting communities, holding the powerful accountable and strengthening democracy. INN programs help these news organizations develop revenue and business models to support strong reporting, collaborate on editorial and business innovation, share services and advance the diverse leaders who are forging a new future for news.”
At the Winter Park Voice, we remain committed to providing you the stories you count on free from paywalls and ads. We operate on a small budget and rely solely on the generous support of our community. Your contributions are tax-deductible and go directly toward publishing news for our community.
It’s now been one year since I started as editor of the Voice and we’ve accomplished a good bit during that time: We officially became a nonprofit, started our Sunday newsletter called the Weekly Roundup and joined INN. But we have a lot more work to do to keep delivering information that would otherwise get lost in this increasingly fragmented news world as the legacy regional newspapers and television stations shrink.
We believe the nonprofit hyperlocal news model is a big piece of the path forward. So, from time to time, you will see us share content that we hope you find relevant from INN partners that we know adhere to our same principles and journalistic standards.
For example, just this week we shared a story from Oviedo Community News about an expansion at Trinity Preparatory School, which straddles the Seminole-Orange border and serves many families in Winter Park.
Collaboration among hyperlocal sites is now every bit as crucial as competition when it comes to serving our common mission of making valuable information accessible to the people who live here.
At the Winter Park Voice, we hope to build on that spirit and do our part to help you feel more informed and plugged in to the place you live, work or like to visit.
As always, don’t hesitate to reach out with questions or suggestions. A big thank you to all of you for your support and readership, which makes this work possible.
Sincerely,
Beth Kassab
Editor
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By: Beth Kassab
No biography available at this time
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Many Winter Park residents have attempted to be heard here but were silenced. We have a number of screenshots of comments put forward but denied without explanation. Many residents have used other Winter Park websites to get city news. I believe you have much to do to prove that you are not the voice of leadership but the voice of the people.
We enforce standards for comments. We don’t publish hate, personal attacks, comments that veer into conspiracy theories or wild speculation, comments centered on unverified information etc. Folks can use their own social media channels for that stuff. Or start their own sites. Or go to one of the other ones you reference. People don’t need the WPV for that. But people clearly need the WPV for something because they keep coming back.
Please post the IRS form 990 for the WPV.
Don’t have one just yet. Stay tuned! Our five figure budget is riveting!
I’m just curious about the $ amount of donations and if the major donors are still the usual suspects
We list our major donors on our site already. If by “usual suspects” you mean people who give big and small contributions to keep news flowing in the city we all care about, then yes.
Please direct me to that list on the site. I can’t find it.
Here it is under the Editorial Policy page: https://winterparkvoice.com/editorial-policy/
Will this require you to stop printing anonymous comments?
A very good idea!!
🤣
Congratulations Beth and thank you for keeping us informed about city politics and policies.
“connecting communities, holding the powerful accountable and strengthening democracy…” connecting communities is a good thing. The rest is just boilerplate of a certain pursuasion that sounds more like npr/pbs than being a conduit for local WP and central FLA communities along with tidbits from other similarly situated locales. As a 4th generation Cracker, you focus on that first piece as a mission statement and I’ll wish you well and look to support
Hrtbrk, “Holding the powerful accountable” could look something like reporting on a commissioner’s back room deals with developer donors and their plans to take your 4th Gen homestead via eminent domain to add a cut through road and build astronomically high priced luxury concierge apartments.
I can’t imagine why any resident would be opposed to holding the powerful accountable, unless they are the powerful ones needing to be held accountable.
Democracy: a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.
“capitalism and democracy are ascendant in the third world”.
That’s how we’ve always rolled and only the powerful who do not want to be held accountable would like to derail this system. It’s fine by me and the majority of society that the WPV will serve to protect it.
Here is their current Mission Statement. Looks good to me.
“The Winter Park Voice is a trusted nonprofit journalism site that covers our City Hall and beyond. We endeavor to engage, inform and connect citizens on all sides of issues affecting the quality of life in Winter Park.“
JW- good catch. I had to go to the collective’s link to find the wpv mission statement after I had posted. It’s spot on for what I would like to see
Beth,
To quote you, “We don’t publish hate, personal attacks, comments that veer into conspiracy theories or wild speculation, comments centered on unverified information etc.”
I don’t recall offering any of the above so am baffled as to why you fail to approve some of my comments here and why I am banned from reading, let alone commenting on the WPV Facebook page.
I would welcome some example where I violated your standards and if none are provided, ask to be free to comment on all WPV pages.
Many of my comments are also banned. It is a mystery. The most recent was a comment on a commission candidate’s latest email blast. It contained none of the prohibited types of content but joined many of my comments in the ether.