By: E&P Staff Independent Newspapers Inc., concentrated in Eastern Michigan, has announced that it is offering a citizen journalism program for residents of Macomb County.
According to Jeff Payne, editor of The Voice, a weekly newspaper based in New Baltimore, Mich., the idea was initially proposed by Kevin Haezebroeck -- senior VP of Journal Register, Independent's parent company -- and Independent President Jeffrey Parra.
"They wanted to replicate some of the things they'd done at The Oakland Press [Journal Register daily based in Pontiac, Mich.], which has a really thriving citizen journalism program," Payne tells E&P Online. Among the regular citizen contributors to the Press are bloggers Brian Pannebecker and Bruce Felt, who blog about local politics from conservative and liberal perspectives, respectively.
Currently, Payne is in the process of accepting e-mails of interest from local citizens who are interested in working at one of Independent's publications, which include The Macomb Daily, and weeklies The Voice, The Armada Times, and the Advisor & Source Newspapers.
"We just put this announcement up online [Tuesday], and it hasn't come out in print yet, so we're going to continue collecting applications for another couple of weeks," says Payne, who expects to find "10 or so contributors" from the project.
After a one-day training session to be held in late August or early September, Payne plans to pair up the newly minted citizen journalists with members of the staff. "The contributors will probably start with secondary features, or police news initially," he explained. "We'll certainly evaluate and try to assess anyone who claims a certain area of interest.
"I really don't care if one person or 10 people get involved -- if it improves our local news content, and means greater involvement with the community, it will be a success," he added.
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