Approximately 87,000 people call Mendocino County their home. For a sense of scale, of California’s 100 largest cities, Mendocino County’s population is only bigger than the bottom five: Merced, Lake Forest, Newport Beach, San Ramon, and Redwood City.
Residents of Mendocino County experience intimacy and camaraderie unknown to the urban centers of the Golden State.
If you live in Mendo, you know the wince and surprise of driving over a rut in the road that you did not expect would be so deep.
If you live in Mendo, you know the saccharine potpourri of fermenting grapes and harvest-ready cannabis.
If you live in Mendo, you know the deep thrum of cortisol and fear prompted by a far-off smoke plume and the echo of sirens on the horizon.
These shared experiences create a culture wrought by a primal, untamed landscape that calls to a select few. Those that make this place their home have the courage to eschew many modern conveniences, the cunning to solve problems independently, and the caring and kindness to check in on their friends and neighbors.
I, Matt LaFever, the founder and lead reporter of MendoFever, am incredibly humbled by the amount of Mendocino County residents that have found this website valuable. In just over a year of reporting, our website on average is visited 10,000 times per day.
Unlike many local periodicals, MendoFever focuses on the totality of our county and important stories from nearby counties. We are not tied to one specific municipality. From the coasties, to the inlanders, from the North County to the South, MendoFever’s 30,000-foot view of Mendocino County has brought into focus the ties that bind us.
Mendocino County residents are bound by a love of savage lands, star-filled skies, quieter lives, and a fellowship forged by decency and good nature deeply rooted in our rural living.
If MendoFever has ever made our far-flung places feel closer, more comprehensible, or captured the essence of Mendocino County life, please consider donating. Telling the stories that define our lives is a labor of love. The hours committed are uncountable, and the energy required seems to be ever-growing.
Please, to honor MendoFever’s work, consider donating. Our PayPal options include monthly payments. Last month our website was visited by 160,340 readers. Imagine a world where every one of those readers committed to donating fifty cents every month. That’d be over $80,000. We know this is not a realistic outcome. But, it begs the question: how much do I value the reporters in my news diet? Would you go to a restaurant and not pay for the meal? Would you hire a contractor to install new flooring and skip the bill?
Online content is often so easy to digest and access. It is easy to assume the creation of that content is equally easy. Please, always remember, the words you read on MendoFever are the product of hours of interviews, scanner listening, and internet combing all aimed at telling the tales that define our lives.
Thank you for your readership, and thank you for your support.
-Matt LaFever, Founder and Lead Reporter of MendoFever
I may not agree with you or Kym Kemps opinions on our local and/or world situation but your news coverage is quick and precise. Much love.
Thanks Matt for your making your news site available even when the reader can’t donate. Keep doing what you love!
Blessings & prayers???
Lol…when can we get an edit option?
Mendofever—the future of Mendocino County journalism. Except for Tom Hine, the Ukiah Daily Journal is asleep in Liberal Land; the Beacon and Advocate are blank pages on the coast, and the AVA, with the exception of Mark Scaramella, has become an assisted living site for aging, make-believe Marxists who believe it’s still 1968. Mendocino County residents, chip in whatever you can to read about what’s really going on and learn exactly who we are.
Signed up for a monthly donation. Keep up the good work and fighting the good fight.