ELi's Community Partnership Push Begins!

If you’re as old as I am, you remember sitting down on a Sunday evening to watch Masterpiece Theater, only to be interrupted halfway through by the talking heads of the pledge drive. It seemed worse than ads on “regular” TV because we were used to getting great programming with no interruptions. Plus, if we weren’t donors, there was always that suspicion that we were gaming the system just a little, watching “Poldark,” ad-free, without sending in a pledge.

So now I’m the talking head (writing head?) here to let you know that without your financial partnership, ELi can’t keep bringing everyone free news about East Lansing.

When we started ELi back in 2014, I always felt a little strange about the whole asking-for-money thing. I honestly imagined people thinking, “I can tell you we can get free news from about a thousand sources on the internet! So why would I pay for yours? It’s not like it’s the New York Times.”

Now, I can tell you with no hesitation that what we give you is something you really can’t get anywhere else.  It’s the only place for hometown news that is entirely and deeply about East Lansing—our schools, our heroes, our developments, our fairs and festivals, our local politics, our businesses, our places of worship—all reported by your friends and neighbors, always held to our high standards of accuracy, clarity, and nonpartisanship.

We give you the factual, meaningful, community coverage absolutely no one else does. Without our reporters’ high-quality work—supported by our tech team and our editors—you would be as much in the dark about East Lansing as we all were two years ago. Who wants to go back to the pre-ELi days?

Here are our twin goals by year’s end:

1. Raise a total of $20,000 in lump-sum, tax-deductible contributions.
2. Increase the number of our monthly boosters to 100.

In that graphic above, you can see what we’ve raised (without asking!) since October 1 of this year. We have a ways to go, but we’re hoping you get why we need you to partner with us. And that you need a big tax deduction for 2016! ELi makes a great tax deduction, as over 90% of what you donate stays right here in the community, and there is no administrative overcharge sucked out of your donations. (ELi’s Publisher and CEO, Alice Dreger, works for free. And it ain't easy.)

Yes! You can help us out without delay by joining in immediately. Click here right now. Just click. Now. That link explains how you can help us with either or both goal. Show us you appreciate us.

Thank you!