Purposes
City Barbs was founded in 2005 by members of a small community group who got tired of waiting weeks for their letters to appear in the local newspapers. Thus the first, foremost, and continuing mission has always been to provide an additional point of view.
Since then the blog has also grown to embrace other purposes, such as:
- Watch-dogging local government and media.
- Encouraging and assisting citizen action.
- Promoting openness and ethics in government.
- Facilitating in-depth understanding of public policies, processes and events.
In delivering on these goals, City Barbs strives to offer facts and analyses of local matters you won’t find presented anywhere else, including countering false and “spun” narratives.
Contributing
Join us on Facebook or Twitter to comment on postings. Keep in mind we may not allow postings on Facebook until you’ve been a member for a couple weeks, so you can soak up a bit of the culture first. City Barbs reserves the right to edit or reject any post or comment it finds to be nonfactual, excessively inflammatory, or disrespectful of City Barbs’ contributors or readers.
To leave tips, offer background information, or to talk about submitting a guest post, use direct messaging or the City Barbs Tip Line at 815-217-4380.
Donations
City Barbs earns no revenue from advertising or subscriptions. We do accept voluntary donations to help Lynn to pay website costs and to attend meetings, obtain and read public documents, and present analyses based on these records and observations. We are also looking to expand operations. If you value the content here and would like to see more, we invite you to make a donation in an amount of your choosing.
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Corrections
We place a correction of fact at the top of the original post along with the date of correction. We might also publish a correction in a separate post if the error is discovered one or more days after the original story appeared.
Minor mistakes (typos, grammar, word choice, re-phrasing for better clarity) are corrected without notifying readers.
Additions & Clarifications
Watch for updates at the tops of original posts along with the dates of additions or significant clarifications.
You will also find additional insights in discussions among members of the City Barbs Facebook Group.
Sometimes you’ll notice that a post contains unanswered questions and guesses as to what’s going on. This is a device for exposing the myths and faults of so-called “transparent” local governments as accessed by citizens, and is often more in tune with our purposes than filling in every single blank. In other words, revealing holes in what is supposed to be readily available information is sometimes partly or entirely the point of a post.