The Echo is a locally-owned, grassroots organisation that came from the community’s need to have a voice.
It has had a strong voice for the last 40 years and aims to continue providing free local news, articles, and entertainment for the next 40 years – but to do that, it needs your support.
The printed Echo is distributed free all over the Shire and beyond. Like The Guardian, there is no paywall on The Echo website, but unlike The Guardian we lack wealthy benefactors.
So while the best way to support The Echo is by advertising, if you have no need to advertise we are asking for locals and everyone who loves The Echo to come on board and support The Echo with a donation (www.echo.net.au/support-us).
Why do we need your support?
The Echo provides a vital local service from supporting local community groups, not-for-profits, organisations like the Byron and Mullumbimby Community Centres, we write articles on local events like school fairs or local arts organisations and charities doing great work in the community.
We also cover community concerns over developments, the environment, homelessness, keep a beady eye on your local council – The Echo is a place for discussion, ideas, and more.
Sometimes you will see these stories in our pages – but there are times when someone comes to us with an issue that, with a little help from The Echo, is resolved before it needs to be raised in a public forum.
From Australia to the US to the UK the world has seen the collapse of the newspaper industry, particularly in rural and regional areas.
As the internet and social media have taken key revenue streams from print papers like classifieds and other forms of advertising Australia has seen more than 200 local, regional, and community newspapers close in the last ten years.
This is having direct impacts on communities who no longer have a place to raise their voices, to have their discussions, to tell their stories. Studies have shown that once a newspaper closes, there is an increased cost to the community and local government.
‘When compared with national news, which is often conflict-driven and sensationalist, local media provides news pertinent to the local community and is linked to community cohesion,’ according to the study News Closures, Trust, and Community Attachment among Regional News Audiences: A Case Study of Australia.
Local news makes for strong communities
‘A study of local news audiences found that community connection was a driver of local news consumption; the top reasons for consuming local news were to know what is going on in their local area (87 per cent) and understand how things may affect them (86 per cent).
‘Typically, in areas where there have been local media closures, there is less news reporting on local government activities, courts, health, and education issues relevant to the community. This decline in news provision weakens the democratic system because local communities are devoid of critical information and there is less accountability.’
Similar studies in the US and UK have shown that when an area loses its local newspaper the cost to the community is increased crime, increased cost of government, and a reduction in community engagement.
A community that cares
The Byron Shire and Northern Rivers is a region known, to the chagrin of some, for its high level of community engagement, environmental action, critical analysis of local, state, federal and international politics and events. It is a community that cares deeply and The Echo is a key part of this.
It is an area that has been hit hard over many years from the Black Summer Fires, and Covid, to the devastating 2022 floods, to the current tough economic conditions. Things are not always easy, but The Echo is here to keep the voice and connection in our community strong. But to do that we need your support through advertising and financial support from the community.
Bringing the news, stories, analysis, and context of the news to you daily online and weekly through the physical paper does cost money. We have to pay our journalists, photographers, artists, printers, and distributors, just to name a few. To do that we need your support to keep going.
The Echo is owned and produced locally, so we are part of the local economy and the money we pay in wages, rent, etc remains in our community rather than profit being creamed off the top of the organisation and being funnelled elsewhere. The challenge is how do we continue to produce high-quality journalism, continue to employ locals, and produce an engaged and engaging physical and online newspaper that meets our community’s needs in these tough times? It is every advert in, and donation to, The Echo which creates the space for the stories on community events, happenings, and concerns.
We do it all with your support. So help us keep our community voice strong and support The Echo here: www.echo.net.au/support-us
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
