Recently it has become a struggle to get off the ground as a media outlet in Lincoln City. The reasons for this are many, and involve being giving equal access by city officials, and others.

A good example of a roadblock encountered in the quest to be the best news outlet in Lincoln City is City Recorder Cathy Steere giving us the runaround when we asked her to be put on the city’s press notification list. She claimed she didn’t see our email requesting access, and only after we sent an additional email asking her why she hadn’t replied, did she grant us access.

After our reporting on the serious harassment allegations raised against City Attorney Richard Appicello, we’ve met with resistance from many city employees, who have refused to answer our questions, and just want the whole thing to go away. “I can’t discuss it” has been used too many times by city staff to be believable.

Threatening Occupational Tax Permit applications from the City of Lincoln City, News Guard staff blocking camera shots, and omitting facts that can skew readers to lean “their” way, and no responses to emails we sent to city officials is severely hindering our ability to report the news in a timely fashion.

That doesn’t mean we’re throwing in the towel or quitting. Quite the opposite. It has steeled our resolve to be at the forefront of news and work that much harder.

People are starting to see what honest, factual news is and can be, and are supporting us because of that. We will continue to report the facts and dig deeper than anyone else to ensure Lincoln City Homepage is the most trusted and reliable news source available.

Please keep in mind that while the city staff and other news media sources have multiple staff, Lincoln City Homepage is a small shop (for now). So any help from the public with stories is always prized above all else and helps keep the content on the website fresh and engaging.

Going Forward

Our readership is growing at an exponential rate and we can’t thank you enough for that. Our Facebook page alone has almost 1,000 followers. That’s up from 250 a few months ago.

And if you have news, or your job involves issuing press releases, please add us to your list of press contacts:. [email protected]

One last thing. It appears everyone at City Hall (Driftwood Public Library, Visitors Convention Bureau, etc) is blocked from visiting any websites created by our web hosting company, WernerHost.com, including local businesses Lil Sambo’s, Captain Cook Inn, Nelscott Reef Big Wave Classic, Loyd Butler Precision Painting, Pacific Pearls TV and others. We have reached out to the city’s IT staff to find out what’s going on, and will let you know what we discover. 

UPDATE 3/18/18

Tony LaSoya, the Information Technology Director at the City of Lincoln City sent us an email apologizing for any inconvenience that the inability to reach the sites listed in the article caused anyone. He said the city subscribes to a Default Threat Protection service that automatically blocks IP address and ranges that have been shown to be a potential threat. He also said lincolncityhomepage.com was blocked before and they added an exception based on a citizen request.

The staff here at Lincoln City Homepage wish to thank Mr. LaSoya for his quick reply and for fixing the issue.