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Your growing hometown news team is on the move — just not very far

New year, new office, new coverage — and more free content — from CDN

By Ron Judd Executive Editor

As journalists, we ask a lot of questions. We get plenty of them back at us, as well. Here are some editor’s answers from the CDN Reader Mailbag, a NW Washington tradition for more than a 50th of a century:

Q: My neighbor is spreading the rumor that CDN is moving out of its global headquarters in downtown Bellingham. Have you been purchased by Elon Musk, or worse, a hedge fund?

A: Musk should be so lucky. Yes, we are moving — about 10 yards, to a new suite in the same historic downtown Bellingham building. Why? To accommodate pending staff growth (eat your heart out, WaPo).

CDN, which began in mid-2021 as a dream of three folks sitting around a small round table, has big plans for 2025 and is in the process of hiring four more smart folks for these jobs: Visual journalist, Audience Engagement Editor, and Health Care and Public Health Reporter via Report for America (all newsroom posts); and an Ad Sales and Production coordinator in the CDN business office. With what soon will be a 16-person newsroom, we were fresh out of desks.

If you’re interested in one of those jobs, or know someone who is, see all the specs at cascadiadaily.com/jobs.

Q: CDN seems to be getting a consistent stream of engaging guest commentaries — some of which I agree with! To make it easier to argue these finer points with friends, might it be possible to make these available outside your paywall?

A: Sure. I was waiting for someone to ask.

OK, not really. This has been asked before — and considered for some time. Answer: Yes.

Starting today, we’re making CDN guest commentaries — opinion pieces written by folks with something to say that requires more space, thought and research than a letter to the editor —  free online at cascadiadaily.com. Previous guest commentaries have been freed from the paywall, as well.

Our paywall exists because the revenue it generates is essential to our ability to pay professional journalists. It’s what distinguishes us from cut-and-pasters masquerading as news organizations.

But making these columns available to all readers for free is in keeping with our foundational mission to encourage thoughtful civic discourse. It complements our existing practice of making all CDN election coverage — both news and opinion — free to all readers as a public service by our local ownership and subscribers and advertisers.

We do hope, of course, that readers will honor and support that mission via a subscription, which truly makes it all possible.

Please check out one of my recent favorite guest columns — this week’s sharp-witted piece by Craig Cole, who wonders out loud whether your U.S. Supreme Court Justices should abide by ethical standards as stringent as … your neighborhood postal worker. Alarmingly illuminating.

Guest commentaries can be emailed to guestcolumns@cascadiadaily.com. You can send one in already complete, or contact me at the email address below with a notion and timeframe.

We’ve been lucky to have a lively or thought-provoking guest commentary on our print and digital pages weekly since CDN’s website went live three years ago next week. (Some weeks, we run more than one guest commentary online, especially if the subject is timely).

We’re grateful for the many people who have submitted these 500- to 800-word opinion pieces; I hope making them free will spawn broader sharing that might encourage even more of you to take the advice on our print Opinion page: “Let your voice be heard!”

The Opinion page has a solid track record of getting pieces on a broad range of public issues, politics (by people of all persuasions) and other matters published, as long as they meet our guidelines for civility, accuracy and length.

Here’s hoping we see even more submissions with the “Free from CDN” logo, all in the spirit of enlightened discourse.

Q: Any other big changes in the works?

A: Actually yes.

  • CDN next week will be rolling out some design enhancements to its Friday print edition, which you’ll see and learn more about in next week’s print paper. So be sure to pick one up if you’re not already a subscriber.
  • We’re also poised to announce a series of public events, a combination of new community meet/greets with our staff and more formal quarterly CDN Town Halls like the one we hosted last fall with special guest Rick Steves. The first of those, scheduled for March, will be announced very soon. A new Monday night CDN Trivia event is launching at Red Star next week, and a public CDN 3-year birthday event is in the works, as well.

Q: As a reader, I’m not really interested in seeing or hearing or even thinking about the incoming president over the next four years. Love your local coverage but can you please separate out any Trump-related news in, a place that’s more easily avoidable?

A: We appreciate local folks’ love of our local news, which comprises about 98% of our content (I challenge any other local publication that puts up news daily to match or beat). But these two categories often merge, and certainly will in the coming months.

We’ve already begun accommodating that, with stories about the international border under the new administration, related to both business and immigration and border policies.

Don’t expect us to engage in the big-media practice of breathlessly reporting every alternate-reality development from the Lesser Washington. But do expect coverage of local impact in the coming year, when policies pledged or imagined by the Trump Administration promise to bring change, for better or worse, to our region.

Change makes news. It would be irresponsible for us to ignore that. In fact, it highlights the need for local reporters to interpret these changes and, critically, document their impact. We’re on it.


Ron Judd's column appears weekly; ronjudd@cascadiadaily.com; @roncjudd.

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