About News in the Grove
News in the Grove is an independent news publication launched in July 2022 by Chas Hundley, a western Washington County journalist born and raised in the Forest Grove area.
This is a side project and you should temper your expectations
This site is a side project and not a full-service newspaper. If you're looking for traditional, comprehensive news coverage, check out our friends over at Pamplin.
We plan to publish stories of interest to readers in Forest Grove, often pulled from relevant stories written for the Banks Post and Gales Creek Journal, two news sites we own and operate to the north and west of Forest Grove.
Ethics, corrections, and opinion
Ethics
We operate under the guidelines of the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics.
Corrections
A human runs this publication, and humans regrettably make errors from time to time. Any errors will be corrected as quickly as possible with a note attached to the bottom of the original story the error occurred in.
Bias & balance
Any news publication that says they operate without bias is lying. The concept of balance is too often used to artificially inflate the validity of falsehoods, and that's not how we operate. We do not give "equal time" to liars and bad actors. There are not always "two sides" that deserve equal weight. We seek truth over balance, and use the tools of journalism—public documents, verified photographs and videos, interviews and data—to seek the truth.
We also believe it's important to disclose bias. Here's ours:
- We are unabashedly a pro-democracy news site
- We believe governments should be transparent and advocate strongly for open meetings laws and public records laws
- We believe that people in power—be that in the public or private sector— should be held accountable for their actions.
- We stand against racism, white nationalism, and bigotry.
- We believe news organizations should pay their journalists a living wage and treat them well, and stand firmly against the ravages of hedge-fund media organizations that treat their employees like garbage.
As paid subscriptions grow, so too will the quantity and quality of stories
When I started my first newspaper, I vastly underestimated the costs it takes to run a full-time news site. After burning through my savings, twice, I'm working toward building sustainable journalism in Oregon. I believe that's found through the support of readers who are willing to pay a fee to receive quality, locally written journalism. I also believe that the news media must innovate to survive, and I will be using this site to experiment and learn, so pardon the occasional and inevitable technological snafus.
Join us here with a subscription.
About me
I was born in Forest Grove, lived on Cedar Street in a big blue and white house across from Pacific University before my parents purchased the old Gales Creek Country Store and Post Office, where we lived for eight years. I've lived in Gales Creek or Forest Grove for most of my life, attended Forest Grove High School, and pretty much lived in the Forest Grove City Library for most of my childhood.