Watershed Voice 2025: By the Numbers
As the year comes to an end, Watershed Voice takes a look back at a year of keeping readers across Southwest Michigan informed.
In 2025, Watershed Voice published 322 stories, averaging 27 articles per month. Over the course of the year, our reporting reached 137,762 total page views from 79,435 visitors.
As the year comes to an end, Watershed Voice takes a look back at a year of keeping readers across Southwest Michigan informed.
In 2025, Watershed Voice published 322 stories, averaging 27 articles per month. Over the course of the year, our reporting reached 137,762 total page views from 79,435 visitors.
Below is a look at our year by the numbers. We covered a wide range of topics — from local government and the environment to elections, arts, and culture. We also welcome feedback from our readers on their favorite stories, what they would like to see covered more closely in 2026, and any other thoughts on this past year of reporting. Readers can share their thoughts by emailing maxwell@watershedvoice.com.
Watershed Voice’s most-read story this year was our continued coverage of the Brittany Wallace Shank case, including reporting that the sheriff added two investigators and partnered with the Michigan State Police in the ongoing missing-person investigation.
Local government remained a core focus of our coverage in 2025. We published 74 stories aimed at keeping the public informed about the actions of their elected officials and working to hold those officials accountable.
Much of this reporting included in-person coverage, with Watershed Voice attending meetings and publishing primers ahead of key votes as well as recaps afterward. We also published 17 election-related stories, providing candidate information, outlining voter outreach efforts, and reporting results on election night.
Watershed Voice also took a deeper look at several issue-based topics impacting our region. This included 25 stories on the environment, 11 on homelessness, and 10 on healthcare.
In addition to hard news, Watershed Voice continued to invest in coverage of arts and culture across Southwest Michigan. We published 74 culture-related stories and 24 stories focused on the arts.
These stories are an important part of the region’s news ecosystem, highlighting creativity, innovation, and the people shaping the communities we serve. For us, arts and culture reporting is a way to celebrate the human mind and spirit alongside our more traditional news coverage.
Watershed Voice also highlighted individual stories through community profiles, publishing four profiles throughout the year. From family immigration stories to celebrations of life, these pieces aimed to share the personal narratives we felt readers needed to hear.
Maxwell Knauer is a staff writer for Watershed Voice.
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Watershed Voice on publishing pause until January 26
We are officially taking our annual three-week publishing pause to give our staff some much needed rest, and an opportunity to reset before hitting the ground running in 2026. We will return on Monday, January 26.
Watershed Voice: Year in Review
Before our three-week publishing pause, Watershed Voice invites our readers to take a look back at the past year in local news. For Watershed Voice, it was a year marked by change, as we transitioned from one staff writer — Najifa Farhat for the first half of the year — to another, Maxwell Knauer, for the second half of the year.
No matter the author of our stories, we aimed to bring prompt, fact-based, independent reporting to Southwest Michigan. Here’s a look at some of our favorite, most impactful, and most-read stories of 2025.
Remembering the life of a Three Rivers titan: Bruce Monroe
While Bruce Monroe’s restoration work reshaped parts of downtown Three Rivers, those closest to him say it was the care he showed people that mattered most.
“Bruce was my father. It isn’t an exaggeration to say that he was as good of a father as anyone could ever hope to have. My brothers and I grew up with endless love and support from our dad. Our family is all still very close, which I think is a testament to my father and the environment he created and fostered for us,” Bruce’s youngest son, Evan Monroe wrote.
