About Niagara At Large - Our Mission Statement
“Democracy cannot function without a well-informed electorate.” - the late news broadcaster Walter Cronkite
Welcome to Niagara At Large – an independent, online source of news and commentary for the greater Niagara region.
Doug Draper, publisher and commentator for Niagara At Large, way back when he was still able to cover environmental issues for a once-proud daily newspaper in St. Catharines, Ontario
Niagara At Large is dedicated to providing news and the most in-depth analysis possible – without fear or favour and always with the goal of getting to the guts of a matter or whatever constitutes the truth – on issues of interest and concern to those of us living and working in a binational region of communities including and neighbouring the region of Niagara, Ontario and the counties of Erie and Niagara in Western New York.
This online site has been launched with the support of long-time journalists and others in our region who share the following beliefs and principles:
- That journalism is a public trust that plays a vital role in providing citizens with the information they need to participate effectively in discussions and decisions that shape the future of their community.
- That journalists can only fulfill their potential as honest brokers of information and watchdogs for their community if their work is not compromised by the pecuniary interests of corporate chains that too often replace the “editorial policies” of newsrooms with “business plans” that define news as a “product” and readers of news as “customers” who might just as well be out at the mall shopping for shoes or laundry detergent.
- That independent sources of news, owned and operated by people who have roots in our communities and therefore share a greater stake in their well-being, are truer guardians of the public trust than distant corporate owners and their shareholders whose first mission is to siphon as much revenue as possible out of our communities, even if that means gutting the resources needed to provide the residents of those communities with quality news.
- That residents of the greater Niagara region would welcome a news source with an eye to covering events and issues of interest and concern to the entire region over newspapers that continue to assume that those of us who live in the south end of the region aren’t interested in news from the north end, let alone news from one side of the Niagara River or the other.
With these principles in mind, Niagara At Large is working to build a diverse network of contributors of news and commentary from across our binational region and beyond with the aim to be the most go-to and engaging forum for information and debate on issues of information and concern to the whole region.
In working toward that goal, Niagara At Large welcomes diverse points of view from all of those who post news, analysis and comments here and will not discriminate against anyone who holds views differing from those of the publisher.
Niagara At Large has no interest and sees no benefit for the region at large and the challenges we face as individuals and communities in simply creating one more blog in cyberspace that becomes an echo chamber for people who share the same view. Nor will this be another one of those sites that post anonymous rants of a vitriolic or potentially libelous nature. All material submitted to this site must be linked to the authors real name and will be moderated through editors before it is posted.
For further information on our ‘Comments Policy” and on how you can “Be a Contributor” to Niagara At Large, please return to our home page and click on those headings above the site’s masthead. All questions or concerns about this sites editorial policies can emailed to Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper at drapers@vaxxine.com.
In the meantime, we encourage you to engage in this site with your comments and contributions. Add niagaraatlarge.com to your Address Book and circulate it to your network of online friends and associates.
With your active participation as a reader, commenter and/or contributor, we may very well succeed in building a fearlessly independent and dynamic source of news and commentary, and the very best forum for reporting and debating the key quality-of-life issues facing our communities facing all of us in our communities across the greater Niagara region.
Doug Draper, Publisher
About The Publisher
A native of the Niagara, Doug Draper began his journalism career at The St. Catharines Standard in 1979 and spent most of the next 19 years covering environmental issues before leaving the newspaper in 1998.
He went on to write for several other publications, including News, Niagara This Week, Pulse Niagara and the former Downtowner. His articles have also appeared in The Buffalo News, Hamilton Spectator.
Through his career, Doug Draper has received several provincial, national and international awards for his reporting and has been invited to participate as a panelist and keynote speaker at numerous conference and workshops on journalism and environmental issues.
Doug Draper now begins a new journey as a founder of Niagara At Large, an online newspaper for news and commentary on issues of interest and concern to residents in a Greater Niagara Region that ecompasses communities on both sides of the Niagara River and Canada/U.S. border.
nice work draper
keep it up
i think you’re on to something here
how about linking to the herald, cloutier’s online newspaper
http://www.ridgewayherald.ca/
Let me know when you go live and I’ll post a blogroll link — you’ve got my coordinates.
Congratulations Doug.We all look forward to a voice of reason presenting unbiased views from the extended Southern Tier. You will certainly have enough material to promote thought and discussion. The many areas in which we are both ignored and out-voted by the North are endless.
Congratulations Doug….as I have said before you are one of the few reporters….if not the only one….in Niagara, who is very objective, well informed and will dig deep to get the whole story. Also, you are principled and have so much experience to build on. Niagara is definitely divided by its newspapers, who only report on either St. Catharines, Niagara Falls or Welland. Getting viewpoints across from south Niagara is very difficult…if not impossible.
All the best to your new venture,
Pat Scholfield
Doug, how exciting!
I wish you all the best on this new project.
Doug:
Good to have a caring voice become independent. I look forward to following your input, and even contributing whenever I feel it appropriate. My Niagara concern is what is happening, or is continuing to happen, to NPC, especially the environmental/ecological side of things that I was very involved with before I retired from NPC in Sept.2008.
Best wishes for success and support.
This looks very promising to us. Best of luck Doug.
Doug, thank you so much for your efforts. It’s great to have another venue for logic and curiosity, for the larger picture. Kudos!
Hello Doug:
A friend informed me of your new venture. I think it’s a great idea and the Huffington Post is a great model of what a lively, stimulating venue of public record can be. Congratulations. I will follow with interest.
Paul
http://fadingintomyth.blogspot.com/
We support the Niagara Heritage Partnership proposal for a non-motorized gorge rim in NYS. Perhaps you’ll add our link?
Michelle
Niagara At Large is great -you are off to a great start – i’m sharing it with everyone in my personal address book and suggesting they do the same. Thank You Doug
Congratulations on your new venture, Doug.
I have followed your columns for years and I always felt your reporting was solid, interesting and guided by the principals of what the press should be doing for a community. I am looking
forward to stimulating and informative articles that will keep our communities informed on
vital issues affecting us all.
Thank you and keep up the good work.
The Murdocks, Disney, the Asners and a host of other corporations have literally corrupted the media to an extent that some damn good Journalists are now walking the Streets of Canada as well as the U.S. of A .
Through this decade we have been subjected to “Brain Washing” as never before witnessed in this so called “Democratic world”. Doug you tell it as it is and that is your forte in life
“Honesty and Integrity” ……Amen
My comment was legit I sent you two emails two prove it
I’m so glad this site is here. Keep informing.
I love your site there’s information here that you just won’t find anywhere else. There’s one thing that everyone living in the Niagara Region has in common and it’s a regional government trying to govern at least 7 distinct and independent urban centers. Thanks for giving a second opinion.
Congratulations, Drapes. You are a leader.
Best of luck, Doug. The more voices, the better. And I’m still springing for beer at the Mansion if Obama gets elected to a second term.
This is a wonderful network when i got to read it.