Jennifer Bowman here. I’m delighted to reflect on our reporting this year that centered our community. More than ever, we’re producing stories not just about our neighbors — we’re doing the journalism for them, and importantly, with them.
In 2025, we launched Amplify South Bay, a newsletter and community-powered project focused on bringing much-needed hyperlocal accountability journalism to southern San Diego County. In partnership with our Documenters program, we’ve dug into housing developments, updates on closely watched construction projects, park funding and more. And every week, we’re letting newsletter readers know about interesting events around the region, the latest on beach closures and the cool work our neighbors do.
Speaking of the Documenters: It was another year of building on our successes of training and paying residents of all walks of life to participate in civic engagement. We welcomed some 200 more people at our training sessions; covered close to 300 meetings; and with our newsroom and other partners, surfaced nearly 70 stories.
But perhaps no better example of our community reporting is our latest project, HOME SICK. Through conversations with more than 100 people over several months, we documented the health impacts and everyday life in the Tijuana River valley, where locals have grappled with a decadeslong sewage crisis.
Our focus on the community — its history, its ways of life and the love that residents have for the region even amid the pollution — was intentional. HOME SICK tells the story of a long-known and well-reported problem in a way that hasn’t been done before.
We published just a few days ago. If you haven’t already, I hope you take the time to explore the multimedia project. We’ll bring more of those voices from the South Bay on our Instagram in the coming weeks.
This is the kind of storytelling you help make a reality when you support inewsource. Thank you!
We have even bigger, ambitious plans to keep powering our community with fact-checked, credible and in-depth reporting. I hope you join us with your support.
– Jennifer Bowman
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