What is townsquare49.org?

Townsquare49.org is an online forum, highlighting the work of community organizations and individuals in order to develop more engaged, interactive Alaskans.

The project is a partnership between the Alaska Community Foundation and Alaska Public Telecommunications, Inc – made possible by a grant from the prestigious and innovative John S. and James L. Knight Foundation Community Information Challenge.

What you can expect to see at townsquare49.org?

• News, Reports, Data and Opinion directly from Alaska’s most respected nonprofit, civic and educational organizations (especially those who otherwise lack the platform and capacity to reach a large audience).
• Rich content from citizen photographers, videographers, bloggers, and journalists in urban and rural Alaska.
• Otherwise hard-to-find city, borough and state government documents and materials.
• Perhaps most importantly: lively, thought-provoking, and civil commentary and discussion of all of this content from the audience.

Our vision for the townsquare49.org project includes:

• A high profile, web-based platform to highlight, translate, and contextualize the work of nonprofit and community partners.
• Easy to use, intuitive, and engaging tools that enable citizens and organizations to take part in community dialog, problem-solving and philanthropy.
• A social and professional network of contributors and engaged users – both in online and in-person environments.
• Outreach to audiences not necessarily engaged by the existing public media platforms.
• A more participatory and engaged citizenry.

The foundational values of the project are those of public media: openness, community-mindedness, civility and inclusiveness.

How can you get involved?

Sign up to become a Voice today. Or email townsquare49 [at] alaskapublic [dot] org.