Editorial Standards
These are the standards we hold Marengo Weekly to. They're public on purpose: a local newsletter is only worth reading if you can trust how it was put together. When a situation isn't covered here, we err toward fairness and accuracy.
What Marengo Weekly is
A free, weekly community newsletter for Marengo, Illinois. It exists to keep residents informed about local government, schools, business, and community life. We are a community resource, not an opinion outlet. We report what happened and help people take part, and we stay out of the fights.
The newsletter speaks with one neutral community voice rather than a stack of personal bylines, which keeps the focus on the town rather than on any one of us. We are open about who produces it: Marengo Weekly was founded and is edited by Justin Bounds, and Travis Coudal handles the website and writes some stories that Justin approves before they run. More on the people behind it is on the About page, and the disclosures that come with it are in the conflict-of-interest policy below.
Accuracy and sourcing
- Get it right before you get it fast. A wrong fact costs more than a late item.
- Go to the primary source. We prefer the actual record, the ordinance, the minutes, the agenda packet, the state database, over anyone's summary of it. We read the document, then report it.
- Attribute, and name the specific record. We say where a fact came from, like "the March 23 council minutes" or "state liquor-license records," so a reader can check us.
- Characterizations belong to the source, not to us. We report that an official body concluded something rather than asserting a contested claim in our own voice.
- Two sources for anything contested or damaging. The more serious the claim, the higher the bar before it runs.
- We don't speculate. If we don't know why something happened, we say so. We don't guess at motives.
- We don't infer gender. A first name is not a source for gender. If it isn't established by a source, we write around the pronoun and confirm before using "he" or "she."
Fairness and naming people
This is the most sensitive area for a small-town publication, so we default to fairness and proportion.
- Routine recaps report the count, not the individual. We say "six of seven members present," not who was absent. Singling out one official in a routine recap reads as a hit piece.
- We praise individuals freely, including volunteers, business owners, students, and staff. Recognition is part of the mission.
- Criticism of named individuals is not our lane. We hold institutions and outcomes accountable, not people by name.
- Right of reply. If an item could reasonably be read as critical of a named person or business, we give them a chance to respond before it runs.
Political neutrality and conflicts of interest
- No endorsements, no campaigning. We don't endorse candidates, ballot measures, or parties, and the newsletter is never used to advantage or disadvantage anyone's campaign.
- Election coverage stays inclusive. If we cover a race, we cover all the candidates in it on the same terms. Our usual instrument is a written questionnaire: every candidate gets the same questions, the same deadline and the same space, and the answers run as given. We don't put one candidate's answers to another. When a candidate makes a factual claim, we check it against the record and say what we found, whoever made it.
- We disclose any relationship a reasonable reader would want to know about, and anyone who helps produce the newsletter steps back from coverage of a race or board they have a stake in.
One specific disclosure. Travis Coudal, who handles our website and writes some stories, is a candidate for Marengo City Council in Ward 4 (election April 6, 2027). To keep that from coloring our coverage:
- Marengo Weekly does not cover the Ward 4 race: not Travis, not his opponents, not the contest.
- Travis has no part in our coverage of any other race for City of Marengo office. Those stories are Justin's, and every candidate in them is covered on the same terms.
- Other elections that affect Marengo, such as the school boards, the township, the county and the Regional Office of Education, we cover the way we cover everything else.
- Anything Travis writes that touches the City of Marengo, or any matter he has a personal stake in, is edited and approved by our editor, Justin Bounds, before it runs. Travis does not have the final say on it, and never has.
- Any story in which someone on our team has a personal interest carries a plain disclosure, so you can weigh it for yourself.
Advertising and editorial
Advertising never buys influence over news coverage. A paid relationship can't shape or suppress our reporting, and ads and sponsored features are always visually distinct from it. Sponsored features are welcome on their own clearly labeled terms (see Sponsored content).
Sponsored content
Local businesses can sponsor a feature, like a spotlight on a Marengo shop or restaurant, and we're glad to tell those stories. A few rules keep them honest:
- We label it. Every sponsored feature is clearly marked as sponsored, so readers always know the difference between a paid feature and our own reporting.
- We still tell the truth. A sponsored feature holds to the same accuracy standards as everything else. We won't print something we know is false, and we don't invent praise.
- The sponsor doesn't get editorial control. A business can't pay us to leave out something newsworthy or to spin the facts. If a sponsor wants the story told a way that isn't true, or wants real news kept quiet, the piece runs as written or it doesn't run. They're welcome to buy ad space instead.
- Sponsorship stops at the feature. Paying for a spotlight buys that spotlight. It doesn't buy favorable treatment, or silence, anywhere else in the newsletter. If a sponsoring business becomes news, we cover it the same as we would anyone else.
Reader questions
Some stories carry a "Have a question about this story?" box. Subscribers can ask, and we answer the ones we can answer from the record, on the page, as Marengo Weekly. A few rules:
- Nothing a reader writes appears until we answer it and our editor publishes the answer. Not every question is published, and we don't say why when one isn't.
- Answers hold to the same standards as stories. We attribute, we name the record, and we don't argue. If a question shows we got something wrong, we correct the story and say so in the answer.
- We don't publish questions about the Ward 4 race, questions that ask us to take a side in any campaign, or claims about named private people. Those are tips, not questions, and they go through the same reporting process as anything else.
- Your name is your call. A question runs as "A reader" unless you choose to sign it with your first name and last initial. We never show an email address. We may shorten a question for length, never change what it asks.
- Asking subscribes you if you aren't already, and the form says so. Confirming the question by email is the same double opt-in as any other signup, and you can unsubscribe anytime.
Corrections
We fix errors promptly and in the open. We don't quietly delete them. On a published web article we append a dated note at the bottom ("Correction (date): ...") rather than editing the facts away. If a material error went out by email, we note the correction in the next issue. Typos and formatting can be fixed silently; factual changes get a note.
Spotted something we got wrong? Emailcontact@marengoweekly.com and we'll look into it.
Photos and images
We use images we have the right to use: our own photos, submitted photos with permission, or properly licensed and public-domain images. We caption and add alt text to images, we credit sources where expected, and we don't alter a photo so it misrepresents what happened.
How this is enforced
Stories move through draft, review, and publish. Work goes to our editor, Justin Bounds, who approves it or sends it back with a note. Nothing reaches readers without that approval, and the weekly issue is previewed and test-read before it's sent.
