By QUINTON SMITH/Lincoln Chronicle
I had no idea – and no intention – when I launched YachatsNews 6½ years ago that it would evolve to what it is today. I thought my little local news site would be a one-person retirement and community service project covering the small community of Yachats, where I live.
But events, reader response and the desire to bring more professionally reported local news to more of Lincoln County changed all that.
Now – including a name change two months ago to Lincoln Chronicle – we’re a vibrant 501c3 nonprofit news service with two paid reporters, a stable of freelance writers, news partners from around Oregon, and a 2025 budget of $150,000.
I spent 45 years working for Oregon newspapers, the last 25 years as an editor at The Oregonian primarily overseeing local news coverage. I launched YachatsNews in January 2019 because after moving here I found that other media had stopped covering local governments in south Lincoln County.
Academics call it a “news desert.” I call it a newspaper desert.
YachatsNews/Lincoln Chronicle grew because we saw a need and the community responded by reading our work and financially supporting our operations.
Now, for the fourth year, it’s time once again to make a one-month special request for your financial support so we can continue – and improve — what we’re doing.
We launched our first local fundraising campaign in June 2022 in order to hire our first staff reporter. Readers responded generously by donating $58,000. The June 2023 campaign was to simply raise more yearly operating funds. In June 2024, with a stable financial base and the goal to hire a second reporter to be based in Newport, all donations and grants were dedicated to supporting that hire.
That second hire — Shayla Escudero — joined the Lincoln Chronicle in March to report on Newport-area news, including county government, education, social services and housing issues. She joined Garret Jaros, who for the past two years has been our south county reporter focusing on Yachats, Waldport, fire districts, natural resources and breaking news.
That second reporting hire is part of our ever-evolving plan, as I like to say, “To do more and better.”
In addition to covering communities and issues, our plan for the rest of 2025 calls for us to design, build and launch a new website by Sept. 1. In addition to our expanded offerings in a better organized space, we want to have a more prominent spot for new community/civic and entertainment calendars, better displayed (and more) obituaries, letters to the editor, and a dedicated place for stand-alone community, event and nature or news photos.
To get the word out about our transition, we have increased our outreach to the Newport area and emphasizing that as other media cut back, we are increasing our coverage with more local in-person news reporting. In April we mailed flyers to 4,000 Newport-area households, we are promoting our news site through the Newport Chamber of Commerce and working with a Eugene firm to spread the word via Facebook advertising.
In addition, to explain who we are and what we do, we will be holding two in-person community meetings in Newport on June 17 and June 26. There’s also one scheduled June 19 in Yachats. (More on those next week.)
The numbers
Each March we issue a “Report to Readers.” Here are some key numbers from that report.
Readership: In 2024 the site averaged more than 165,000 page views a month for a total just over 2 million – a 21 percent increase over 2023;
Subscribers: Although everything we do is free to all 24/7, more than 2,950 people – metric services call them “subscribers” — have signed up to receive an email of story summaries each Wednesday and Friday mornings.
Money: Our 2024 revenue was $132,000 – 64 percent from readers, 24 percent from grants and 12 percent from advertising. Our 2024 expenses totaled $109,000 – everything from fees for access to court records, web hosting services and subscriptions, travel expenses, insurance policies, pay to freelance writers and photographers, and of course salary and benefits for our reporters. Our 2025 budget is $150,000, with most of that increase coming from the addition of the second reporter’s salary, health insurance and expenses.
The ask
So this month, with grants specifically set aside for rebranding and web design expenses, we are asking readers and supporters to replenish our operating funds. Our goal this month – like the last three years — is to raise $40,000 to $50,000 from readers, especially those in the Newport area now benefitting from our expansion.
Here’s how to help.
A check: Some readers just like to write a check and be done with it. If you are one of those people, please make the check out to Lincoln Chronicle/YachatsNews and mail it to P.O. Box 284, Yachats, Ore. 97498.
Online via PayPal: Others prefer to donate electronically — either one time or via smaller, monthly amounts. Our PayPal account can handle both methods. Simply go here to make a one-time donation or set up an automatic monthly donation.
Gifts of stock: This year we also have available a new way to give – the gifting of stock to an account we have set up at Fidelity Investments. If you are interested in learning more about that, contact me via email at YachatsNews@gmail.com or call me at 503-970-3867.
Advertise: Or, if you own a business or head an organization, you can support us and help yourselves by advertising and getting your message in front of 170,000 readers a month. Our ad director, Tiffany Sullivan of Blue Sprocket Brokerage can be of great help. Here is a link to our advertising rate card and Tiffany’s contact information.
This month and our mission
This is the first of four stories this month asking for your support but also explaining our work, our plans, and the evolving local and Oregon news landscape. I’ll leave you with our mission statement:
“Provide local, professionally-reported, fair, unbiased straightforward news of Lincoln County and the central Oregon coast, its governments, people, community organizations, businesses and the natural environment with an emphasis on good government, transparency, community involvement, civic participation and engagement. Independent, non-profit news. Free to all, funded by readers.”
Thank you for reading and for your support.
— Quinton Smith/editor & board chair
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