Today's retrospective issue is the last, at least for a while. The website will remain active allowing access to a deep library of stories addressing the city's pressing topics.
Monumental growth. An exploding population. A booming arts scene. And from all of that, a renewed metropolis full of possibilities, but facing the reality that some are being left behind as the city prospers.
This is the tale of Denver in the 21st century captured in the pages of Confluence over the past decade. Through hundreds of stories, talented journalists delved into the complex issues that have abounded during an unprecedented era of change, focusing on the people, nonprofits and civic institutions tending to the ideals of equity, the environment, wellness and innovation. (And beauty, celebration and fun, too — it hasn’t been all that serious.)
It’s a body of work that we reflect on with pride as Confluence ceases to publish this week. Today’s issue is the last, at least for a while.
The reason: Let’s just say the news business is complicated these days, and Confluence’s model of enhancing traditional media revenue from advertising with underwriting support for independent journalism from organizations, agencies and businesses with a stake in the community worked for a while in Denver, and then it didn’t.
In the meantime, stories got told. Efforts that deserved recognition and support got their due. Issues that might have been overlooked were explored from multiple perspectives. And via social media, the ideas Confluence wrote about were blasted out far and wide.
Accompanying that was the meaningful, human-to-human dialogue that took place at summits, workshops, lectures ad idea sessions produced with community partners. Confluence informed people, but it also encouraged them to share their own experiences, to inform each other.
For this final issue, we are resurrecting a few of our favorite stories. Some are here because they were popular with readers, others because the folks who wrote them wanted their words to have another look. They aren’t a definitive retrospective or a greatest hits, but a sampling of the varied way Confluence covered current events.
The site will remain active and no doubt, well read; Confluence’s page views came largely from internet searches. Readers found our stories when looking for information on specific topics. Those topics remain relevant and so do the stories. At least for a while.
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