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WisCommunity has been selected to participate in the LION Publishers Sustainability Audit program. The program includes a thorough assessment of each participating news business, including actionable recommendations, resources, and up to $20,000 in direct funding to help them take the next steps toward organizational sustainability. We are one of 43 LION Publishers sites that are participating in this round of the audits.
We have completed most of the audit process and are currently awaiting the audit report that will make recommendations about how to make WisCommunity more financially sustainable. We hope to make serious improvements to our news coverage along with attracting more users and members, allowing us to continue on a path to sustainability. Look forward to changes.
You may read more about this program and the other participants at the LION website.
There are still lots of things going on. I've closed the community survey that has been running for a few weeks and am looking over the results, which I will use to help guide the direction of WisCommunity.
I recently received news that we will receive a grant for the Sustainability Audit that has been going on for the past couple of months. The money will be coming through LION Publishers, The Knight Foundation, and the Google News Initiative. This is good news and will help to fund some new things here, including hiring some freelance reporters. Please contact me if you are interested in writing for us.
One of the things I agreed to do in the audit was to consider a re-branding of the site. WisCommunity made sense when the site was intended to be a state-wide discussion platform in its early days, but it has slowly morphed into a news website, and the name no longer fits. There will be a contest to pick a new name - watch this space.
Obituaries are coming soon. I have signed a contract with legacy.com to work with them on obituaries. Many of you have told me over the past few years that you would like to have a local source of obituaries. There are still some issues to work out, but expect to see them here in the next few months. We will also be accepting obituaries on-line that will not only appear here but in the network of legacy.com websites.
Some time in the next few weeks we will be starting to send out an events newsletter on Thursday every week. It will list our featured events for the upcoming week. We're changing to a new email distributor for this - there may be some irregularities for a while.
We are also having discussions about a state-wide syndication of news stories from independent publications. This is just in the early stages but is an exciting opportunity.
There will be a WisCommunity booth at Let's Paint The Town in July. Stop by and let us know what you'd like to see us do.
As some of you may have noticed the website was flat on the floor for a while yesterday. This was entirely my fault and stemmed from a failed upgrade which took a while to back out. In any case, things are now back to normal.
I have been in Chicago for several days at the LION Sustainability Summit and am at the moment brimming with new ideas. Stay Tuned.
Steve is a web designer and recently retired from running the hosting and development company Cruiskeen Consulting LLC. Eye On Dunn County is now published by Eye On Dunn County LLC, and publication of this site continues after his retirement.
Steve is a member of LION Publishers , the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, the Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce, and the Local Media Consortium, is active in Health Dunn Right, and is vice-president of the League of Women Voters of the Greater Chippewa Valley
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