Why I started FāVS News and why it still matters today

By Tracy Simmons | FāVS News Editor

I did not set out to start a newsroom.

I set out to answer a question that kept nagging at me: What would it look like if an entire news organization was devoted — every single day — to covering the faith communities of the Inland Northwest? Not as one beat among many, but as the whole mission?

So in 2012, I started FāVS News. Just me, a laptop and a conviction that local religion journalism mattered.

Fourteen years later I am still convinced. And I am still here.

Some of my favorite memories from those early years involve our Coffee Talks — monthly gatherings at local coffee shops where our writers would sit on a panel and discuss a specific topic with the community. Some months we had 15 people. Other months we had 70. What I remember most is not the panels themselves but what happened around them — readers meeting writers, strangers discovering they shared values across different faith traditions, conversations that spilled out onto the sidewalk long after the event ended.

That is what local religion journalism does at its best. It does not just inform people. It connects them.

COVID ended the Coffee Talks. A lot of things ended in those years. But the mission did not. Today FāVS has 22 freelance reporters and 35 columnists covering faith across Washington state and northern Idaho. We publish at least two stories every single day. We syndicate to 15 regional and national publications. We have published nearly 10,000 stories since that first one in 2012.

And we are still the only digital newsroom in America doing this.

That is not something I say to boast. It is something I say because it is both remarkable and fragile. Remarkable because what we have built here in Spokane has no parallel anywhere in the country. Fragile because nonprofit journalism does not run on conviction alone.

April 9 is Local News Day — a national day celebrating local journalism and the communities it serves. This year I am asking you to be part of keeping FāVS going.

If a FāVS story has ever informed you, challenged you or helped you understand your neighbor a little better — please consider making a gift. And right now, donors who give $50 or more can choose a book written by one of our own writers as our thank-you.

All these years in, I am still answering that same question. I hope you will help me keep going.

Donate to FāVS News this Local News Day

FāVS News uses professional journalists and thoughtful commentary to explore faith, values and ethics. Support journalism like this by making a tax-deductible donation. FāVS is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. © FāVS News. All rights reserved. Reproduction permitted only to authorized media partners or with written permission.