How sweet it is! WIP's sixteen-year anniversary

author : Sandy Mayes

by Sandy Mayes

What a great year it has been for Works In Progress! It was one year ago this month -- our 15-year anniversary -- that we put out a call to renew the sense of mission and the collective sense of ownership, responsibility, and community collaboration that gave birth to this newspaper. And the community came through.

The Layout Team: By far the most exciting new development at WIP is the formation of our new Layout Team. It's been almost one year since Phan Nguyen and Melissa Roberts joined our all-volunteer collective, each contributing both a high level of technical support and exceptional talent in graphic layout artistry. Their participation and contribution to this project has had an immeasurably energizing effect on the collective -- and one outcome for you, the reader, is the snazzy new look of the paper you now hold in your hand.

An Engaged Readership: More than most communities, ours is one in which people demand to participate in the decisions that affect their lives -- and that culture of citizen engagement has been reflected on these pages. It is an active collaboration between the readership and the members of the WIP collective that sustains this project: a free and independent forum for voices and views often ignored or misrepresented by the corporate media. Local democracy depends on grassroots media projects like this one, and such projects can only thrive in an engaged community like ours.

Financial Gifts: WIP has received a number of generous gifts this year -- from individuals as well as organizations. And it's a good thing because without them we would have been in deep trouble. Many thanks to the Community Sustaining Fund for $400 toward the purchase of a desperately needed laser printer. (Seriously, we were running to Kinko's in the wee hours before going to press each month.) The one we found on eBay is a real gem. And thanks as well to the Olympia Food Co-op for the one-time gift of $350 -- and for their many years of support through advertising. And to all our regular advertisers ... your ongoing support is very much appreciated.

These gifts, along with donations from individual community members, helped to compensate for the one area where we still need significant improvement: finances. Even with an all-volunteer staff, it costs several hundred dollars per month to produce this newspaper. These costs are only partly met through advertising. If you depend on Works In Progress, this free and independent community forum, we must ask you to contribute financially. As always, you can refer to page 2 for information about subscriptions and donations. You can also now visit our new website at http://www.olywip.org/wip and make a donation through our new PayPal link (which should be up and running by the time we go to press).

Join the WIP collective: If you are someone who values this resource, believes in its mission, and can commit to participating in one or more of the many tasks needed to make it happen every month, there is a welcoming place for you in this collective. We are especially in need of people with good proofreading skills, website management skills, and someone who can take on a delivery route. Give us a call or send an email to discuss how you might plug in.

Very few communities are either fortunate or resourceful enough to have a newspaper like Works In Progress. It has taken a special kind of synergy between the community and the WIP collective to keep this project going for sixteen years. This has been an especially good year...May we have many more.

Sandy Mayes is the WIP content and production coordinator. To contact WIP call (360) 956-1136 or write wip@zhonka.net