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In the middle of covering a horrific mass shooting in Michigan this week, publisher Alice Dreger stopped to explain to readers about how her nonprofit news organization stays focused on community needs.

The staff of East Lansing Info had worked with local police two years ago to conduct emergency drills to better prepare for a local crisis, she wrote on Tuesday.

Based on what they learned, “We stayed out of the way of emergency services. We knew not to report from the scanners and social media, because that can just cause unnecessary panic and wrong moves. We tried to keep people informed about shelter-in-place orders and to remind them how to sign themselves up for direct emergency alerts.”

In the aftermath of the tragedy, Dreger and her managing editor concluded that their role was NOT to duplicate what the big media organizations were doing.

“Instead, our aim is to be here for you, the people who live here, and to provide you the information you need to get through today and tomorrow and the next days. We are working on bringing you information about closures, postponements and psychological support services,” she wrote. “We are also working on having our reporters bring what I would call ‘witnessing’ – reporting that helps you feel seen and heard, reporting that recognizes that you are a member of a community in shock and in grief.”

I have never met Alice, but I have come to know her work through an organization we both belong to: the Institute for Nonprofit News. I admire her passion for news and ingenuity in growing her grassroots news organization.

Like me, she is capping her career by giving of her time to build a local-focused news organization that will serve the community long beyond the time she is actively involved. I hope LkldNow never has to cover something this traumatic, but if we do, Alice has built an enduring model of how to be prepared and keep community needs topmost in reporting.