AAN Announces Relief Effort to Support Gambit Employees

The Association of Alternative Newsweeklies: "The Association of Alternative
Newsweeklies announced Friday that it has established a multi-pronged effort
to provide immediate relief to employees of its New Orleans-based member paper
who have been displaced by Hurricane Katrina.
The centerpiece of the effort is a special fund that the association has
established in its Alternative Newsweekly Foundation to accept charitable
contributions from members who want to provide immediate assistance to Gambit
Weekly employees -- our member newspaper in New Orleans. The fund is accepting
donations immediately and will begin sending checks to displaced employees
today.
"The folks at Gambit have lost their homes and their jobs, and are without
any source of income, and they need help," says AAN President Kenneth Neill,
publisher of the Memphis Flyer. "This association is going to do everything it
can to provide assistance in their time of need."
The association will also serve as a conduit to help Gambit employees find
temporary assignments or permanent positions at other AAN-member alternative
weeklies, many of which have already contacted AAN with job offers. AAN will
also serve as a facilitator for members who would like to help the displaced
employees find transportation, lodging, meals and other bare necessities.
Finally, AAN will produce a series of house ads that members can use
online and in their own papers directing readers to contribute to the Gambit
fund as well as an as-yet undetermined disaster-relief organization. The house
ads will be available for download from the AAN Web site by next Thursday.
Before any of this can happen, AAN needs to locate the displaced
employees. To that end, the association earlier today set up a message board
on its Web site (http://forums.aan.org) in order to locate missing workers.
Margo and Clancy DuBos, co-owners of Gambit Communications, have been in
regular contact with AAN since Tuesday. Late Friday evening, after an
exhilarating day in which he participated in a nautical search-and-rescue
mission, Clancy spoke with AAN Executive Director Richard Karpel and learned
that the AAN relief effort had been announced. He later sent this message via
e-mail:

"Since Katrina struck, we have been overwhelmed by the enormity of the
destruction left in its wake. We are even more overwhelmed by the outpouring
of assistance and generosity from our fellow AAN members. This is the highest
calling of our organization -- making a real difference in the lives of others
-- and proof of what a great group of professionals belong to AAN. We will
never forget you. God bless you all."

AAN members can make tax-deductible contributions to the Gambit Fund by
check or credit card. Checks should be made payable to the Alternative
Newsweekly Foundation. Checks written by member companies should include the
word "Gambit Fund" in the memo section; checks written by individual AAN
members participating in a matching-funds program should include the name of
the company they work for. They should be sent to the foundation at 1250 Eye
Street N.W., Suite 804, Washington, D.C. 20005.
To contribute by credit card, members can call AAN at 202-289-8484, or
e-mail Tiffany Kildale at tkildale@aan.org.

Several AAN-member companies have already announced significant
contributions to the fund.
Houston Press and New Times Media have announced that together they are
donating $15,000 to the relief fund. New Times will also match the tax-
deductible donations that New Times managers and employees make to the fund,
up to an additional $15,000.
Village Voice Media will also contribute $15,000 and match its employees'
contributions up to $15,000.
The Stranger and Portland Mercury have pledged $1,500, and will match
employee contributions up to another $1,000.
The San Francisco Bay Guardian announced that it will contribute $2,000 to
the fund.
Willamette Week pledged a minimum of $3,000.
City Newspaper made a donation of $1000 and said it would match employees'
donations up to $500.
Alternative Weekly Network sent a check for $5000 and will seek additional
assistance from AWN members.
The Austin Chronicle pledged $1500.
The Charleston City Paper is taking donations from employees and will
match the contributions dollar for dollar.
The Memphis Flyer pledged a minimum of $1500 to the Gambit Fund, matching
every employee's contribution dollar-for-dollar.
Many other AAN members expressed an interest in helping Gambit and its
employees, but were unable to contact AAN in time to be included in this
announcement. Additional contributions will be announced on the AAN Web site
as they are received.
Since its founding in 1978, the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies
has grown to include 125 free-circulation weekly newspapers throughout North
America. More than 21 million readers in markets as diverse as Memphis and
Montreal, Pittsburgh and Pasadena, Chicago and Charlotte, rely weekly on their
local alternative newspaper. For more information about AAN, go to
http://www.aan.org.

AltWeeklies.com, a project of AAN, is a new Web portal featuring the best
news, arts and investigative reporting from more than 100 alternative
newsweeklies in North America.
"