Imagine a cooperatively owned newspaper entity based in Philadelphia. Could it be a worker-owned cooperative enterprise or would it be consumer owned? Will it be print or is there enough revenue-generating power to have an online presence that can be paid for from ad revenue? Would there be enough educated people in the region able to invest and grow this service?

A definition from the International Cooperative Alliance in 1995: A co-operative is an autonomous association of persons united voluntarily to meet their common economic, social and cultural needs and aspirations through a jointly-owned and democratically-controlled enterprise.

What needs are there in this region that can be met by this news media cooperative? Would it be enough to grow and support this project?

Are you interested in exploring this as part of a committee? Could we use the Weavers Way Shuttle as a jumping-off point or should this be approached anew, from scratch? 

Start-up co-ops are time- and research-intensive with no guarantee of success and would require many hours of volunteer time before a “real” entity would emerge. 

What could it look like? From my experience advising our many local food co-op start-ups, we’d start with a small committee, meet and hash out early details and develop a well prepared and practiced presentation in a large or series of large community meetings with the goal of presenting and recruiting dozens of people to join committees to research and work on presenting possibilities to a central steering committee. 

Once work is started, those committees, membership, legal, finance, governance would meet to bring work product together for review and guidance for and from a steering committee to lay groundwork for an incorporation, fundraising and eventual sales of shares that would be applied to the capital needed to begin operations on reporting on the news this community wants. 

Could this be successful? Do we have the needs and is there an audience willing to join just such an outfit? How do we pay the employees and cover operational expenses? Is there grant money that we can use to seed this? What would a finished product look like and could it be replicated week after week and day after day? 

Come and join me in this!