Statement of Purpose - Yolo Local

In the void left by shrinking news coverage in Yolo County, Davis Media Access (DMA) is working to build a civic information project for Davis and beyond. We’ve named this project Yolo Local.

We believe the shrinking of local newsrooms and corresponding loss of vital news and information affects every aspect of community life. When information is scarce or inequitable, civic engagement is diminished and our communities suffer.

We believe that readily available, fact-based local news and information is a public good, and that it’s necessary for communities to be connected and to thrive.

Civic media practice holds that we have an obligation to build a more equitable information ecosystem from the ground up, and that legacy media systems have frequently been inequitable, often misrepresenting marginalized peoples and those not in power.

Davis Media Access (DMA) has a decades-long history of providing non-partisan public access to media tools, training, and local information. With technological and journalistic expertise and deeply woven connections countywide, we believe DMA is uniquely positioned to create a civic information hub for Yolo County–-Yolo Local–-and are committing resources towards that end.