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The past month has been a crazy month for San Diego media outlets. First, hotel magnate and developer Doug Manchester purchases the city's sole daily paper, and now online news org, Voice of San Diego, announced it was cutting down its workforce, laying off education reporter Emily Alpert, community reporter Adrian Florido, and photographer Sam Hodgson.
"Today was a difficult day of change for voiceofsandiego.org," reads a message from Voice's editors Scott Lewis and Andrew Donahue. "Last year, we raised more than $1.1 million and drew up a budget for 2011 at $1.2 million. We're projecting lower revenue for the coming year and set the budget at $1 million."
Donahue and Lewis said part of the reason for the layoffs was uncertainty in securing grants from national foundations.
"We're in the process of building a thriving membership program to reduce our reliance on foundations, but we need time to fully establish a diverse donor base. Quite simply, like many of the agencies we cover and many families across San Diego, we have to be realistic about our prospects for the New Year."
There's little doubt many of you will be sad to see them go and you may disagree with our decisions. We recognize and understand that."
The editors don't expect any additional layoffs, but did make sure to include information regarding their current fundraising efforts.
"It may seem awkward to be running our year-end fundraising campaign -- an ambitious one at that -- in the midst of these changes. But actually, it's quite appropriate. As a nonprofit, this is our challenge: Our service depends on your support. If you value our investigative reporting, analysis, our daily Morning Report, partnerships with local media and events, please support this effort."
Read the entire message here.
The past month has been a crazy month for San Diego media outlets. First, hotel magnate and developer Doug Manchester purchases the city's sole daily paper, and now online news org, Voice of San Diego, announced it was cutting down its workforce, laying off education reporter Emily Alpert, community reporter Adrian Florido, and photographer Sam Hodgson.
"Today was a difficult day of change for voiceofsandiego.org," reads a message from Voice's editors Scott Lewis and Andrew Donahue. "Last year, we raised more than $1.1 million and drew up a budget for 2011 at $1.2 million. We're projecting lower revenue for the coming year and set the budget at $1 million."
Donahue and Lewis said part of the reason for the layoffs was uncertainty in securing grants from national foundations.
"We're in the process of building a thriving membership program to reduce our reliance on foundations, but we need time to fully establish a diverse donor base. Quite simply, like many of the agencies we cover and many families across San Diego, we have to be realistic about our prospects for the New Year."
There's little doubt many of you will be sad to see them go and you may disagree with our decisions. We recognize and understand that."
The editors don't expect any additional layoffs, but did make sure to include information regarding their current fundraising efforts.
"It may seem awkward to be running our year-end fundraising campaign -- an ambitious one at that -- in the midst of these changes. But actually, it's quite appropriate. As a nonprofit, this is our challenge: Our service depends on your support. If you value our investigative reporting, analysis, our daily Morning Report, partnerships with local media and events, please support this effort."
Read the entire message here.