About the Observer

Who we are

Our family has grown up on Torch Lake, for the same reasons so many people spend their time here: the clear water, the shoreline, and small places like the Clam River mouth.

The Observer is published by Observer Staff: a Forest Home Township resident and taxpayer for more than ten years, a longtime customer at Dockside, and a visitor to the beach by the Clam River mouth. Stories carry the byline “Observer Staff.”

That is why this site exists. It isn’t just a collection of public records: it’s reporting from someone who uses this shoreline, about decisions that will shape it. The records are how we keep that reporting honest. Every claim that matters is tied to a document anyone can read.

Disclosure. Observer Staff live and pay taxes in Forest Home Township, are longtime Dockside customers, and visit the beach near it. That is our stake, stated plainly. Observer Staff hold no property, option or business interest in the Dockside site, the BaseCamp development or any neighboring parcel, and have no financial interest in the outcome of the matters covered here. If that ever changes, we’ll say so here.

What we cover

One lake. The Observer reports on development on Torch Lake’s shoreline and in its watershed, and on the rules each township writes for it — Forest Home, Helena, Clearwater, Milton and their neighbors. The front page carries the lead investigation; Around the lake carries briefs from the townships; What we’re watching is our notebook of status checks on public systems, each dated and verifiable. When the record changes, the pages change with it, and say when.

How we report

• From the record. Every claim that matters is tied to a public record — a recorded instrument number, a permit number, an ordinance section, or a dated meeting minute — and that reference appears beneath the section it supports.
• Documents posted. The key primary documents are posted alongside each story, under clean file names, so readers can read them in full.
• Re-checked before publishing. Live sources, such as state permit status, are checked again on the date shown in the story’s “Updated” line.
• News and suggestions are labeled. News sections say what the records show. Sections marked How to have your say help readers take part, for example with a sample letter, and they may state a view. They’re labeled so you can always tell the difference.
• Everyone’s side, from the record. We don’t do interviews. We report what public records show, and that includes what developers, officials and agencies say in their own filings, letters and minutes. We quote their case fairly, in their own words.
• What we don’t know is said plainly. Each story lists records that are not yet public or could not be obtained.
• Not legal advice. We report what the records and ordinances say; decisions rest with the public bodies that make them.

Responses

Anyone named in a story, or whose project or decision we describe, is welcome to respond. Send a written response to corrections@torchlakeobserver.com. We’ll publish it with the story, dated and in full (we may trim for length, and we won’t publish anything unlawful). If it shows we got something wrong, we’ll correct it and say so.

Tips & documents

Records, photographs and first-hand knowledge from readers make this reporting possible. If you have a document, a dated photo of the shoreline, or information about a matter we cover, write to tips@torchlakeobserver.com. We verify what readers send against the public record before using it, and we don’t publish who sent it.

Corrections

If something we published is wrong, tell us: corrections@torchlakeobserver.com. Include the story, the passage, and the record that shows the error. Confirmed errors are corrected in the story, and the correction is noted with its date in the story’s update log.

Corrections log

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