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Good morning,
Spring is finally springing up here on Mount Desert Island. The daffodils are up, the restaurants are unfurling their awnings and the tourists are trickling in. Winter coats have been pushed to the back of closets and heavy boots put away.
Spring puts an end to those dreary, liminal months of mud season, when we can't help but envy Californians with their sunshine and Portlanders with their restaurants, and reminds us why we stay. Nowhere is more beautiful or bountiful than MDI between May and October.
Here at The Monitor, spring also means fundraising. It costs money to do this work: to send our reporters out into communities to hear firsthand what matters to Mainers, to file FOAA requests, call experts, attend legislative hearings and read through documents — then to translate that information into a narrative that makes sense of it all.
We're not just doing this because we enjoy it (although we usually do). We're doing it because we believe in giving Mainers trustworthy information they can use to understand their communities and make decisions about their lives.
I use our reporting all of the time: to research my daughter's daycare, to see what my lawmakers are up to, to see how my county is spending its ARPA money. I use it to inform my arguments at dinner parties and to contextualize my town's plans to address the housing crisis. I use it to better empathise with people whose lives are vastly different than my own.
We need to raise $40,000 to support this work. The Monitor is free to read and free for any news organization to republish because we want it to be as widely available and accessible as possible. But we need your help to make that happen. If you are able, please consider making a donation. If you're already supporting us, thank you. We truly could not do this work without you. |
