Dear Readers,
Engagement Director Orlando Bailey has been the heart of BridgeDetroit since its founding in 2020. He has spent the last four years shaping the strategies of how we interact with all of you and serve the community.
Now, Orlando is moving on to the next big thing in his career: Executive Director at Outlier Media. We are proud and support him even though his joyful presence and skills will be missed in our newsroom. We are so grateful for everything that he has helped create here.
Outlier and BridgeDetroit also have a long history going back to the founding of our organization and we remain collaborators in the nonprofit media space. With Orlando’s move, we will deepen this connection to achieve our mutual mission of serving Detroiters.
We look forward to seeing what we can do together to build on our existing partnership.
As far as BridgeDetroit’s plans go, we have seen the importance of having the right person leading engagement. We have grown to become a vital source of information for many Detroiters. We will continue these efforts to serve Detroiters and provide the news coverage you ask us for. We will continue to convene in-person events and gatherings.
Our upcoming plans include:
- A summer community conversation series focused on voter access and information, reparations and I-375, housing and home repair and refugee resources. More details will be announced soon.
- Building partnerships with local religious institutions to reach more “disconnected” Detroiters.
- Community canvassing, where we knock on doors and talk to folks about the issues that matter to them in their neighborhoods. We have already started: We canvassed five blocks near the new Detroit sign to find out if residents had been told about the coming construction and got to have input on the design (answer: no and no).
- More public safety coverage, which will be supported by a partnership between Planet Detroit and Chalkbeat Detroit locally and Next City nationally. We heard you tell us this is important to you and we are making it happen.
Moving forward, my vision for BridgeDetroit remains the same as when I started in January: I want to deepen our ties to the community and provide more resources to residents that help you live your lives. I want to expand outreach to residents who don’t have reliable high-speed internet access through other means. And I want to promote media literacy by teaching Detroiters skills they can use to keep themselves informed in their daily lives.
We must be more than a newsroom – we must be a public service.
BridgeDetroit was formed on the principle of asking Detroiters what they wanted to see and then giving it to you. We have been building that for four years. The next step is to empower you to know where to find reliable data and information and how to interpret it to help you live your best civic life, knowing you have a community partner there to help you along the way.
Thank you for your continued support and trust.
Laurén Abdel-Razzaq
Executive Director
P.S.: Our engagement efforts start with you and what you want to see. If there’s anything you think we should do more of or do better, we want to know. Send us a note at bridgedetroit@bridgedetroit.com or use the form below:
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