Due to a drop in its subsidies, the online media founded in 2005 is now calling for donations to continue publishing. Most of its contributors write voluntarily about life in their neighborhoods.
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Since the beginning of December, the Bondy Blog website has launched a call for donations. “We need these donations, because maintaining our media is becoming more and more complicated from year to year.“, explains Sarah Ichou, director of online media. “We depend on government subsidies. These have been lower and lower for two years and we are counting on the support of our readers to keep up. To continue to give voice to the inhabitants of working-class neighborhoods.”
To compensate for the drop in subsidies, the media had to reinvent itself and create content in partnership with associations. “It’s a way of continuing to pay the few employees, but the survival of the media is at stake today, because most of the contributors are volunteers and the blog requires time and investment from everyone.“. Sarah Ichou is one of the three employees of the Bondy Blog but “only part-time. The rest of the time, I’m a volunteer giant of the blog“, she says.
For the editorial director, the drop in government subsidies reflects the “lack of government interest in residents of working-class neighborhoods.” According to Helena Berkaoui, editor-in-chief, “State subsidies have fallen significantly since the death of Nahel Merzouk in Nanterre” in June 2023 following a police shooting.
In terms of figures, the subsidies granted by the National Agency for Territorial Cohesion attached to the Ministry of Culture amounted to 150,000 euros in 2022 compared to 70,000 euros in 2024 for the media based in Seine-Saint-Denis .
Founded in 2005, the Bondy Blog is today in danger. “The media was created after the death of Zyed Benna and Bouna Traoré in Clichy-sous-Bois.” The two teenagers died when they were electrocuted in an electrical transformer while trying to escape a police check.
“The idea is to make the voice of working-class neighborhoods resonate, to allow all their inhabitants to tell their stories. The Bondy Blog is a response to the urgency of giving working-class neighborhoods a media voice. To carry the stories of those who live there“, says Sarah Ichou, editorial director and originally from Bondy in Seine-Saint-Denis.
On a daily basis, around thirty contributors publish articles on various subjects. “We talk about culture, sport, music, but also politics. Anyone can suggest topics to us even without being a journalist“, explains Sarah Ichou.
The Bondy Blog is a media, but also an association. “Our Tuesday editorial conferences are open to everyone. Everyone is free to propose subjects and learn to tell and write them in a journalistic way. says Selim Kourchi, journalist. “Our premises in Bondy serve as a place to write our articles, but also as a meeting place for young people from working-class neighborhoods. We organize conferences and media education sessions, it is a real place of life“, note Sarah Ichou.
Nearly 20 years after its creation, the Bondy Blog has published more than 1,000 articles written by several hundred journalists and contributors. “We also helped train several hundred journalists who work in the largest editorial offices in France. “, explains Selim Krouchi, editor at Bondy Blog in a Youtube video published by the media.
The “BB”, as its contributors call it, launched a preparation course in 2010 in partnership with the Lille Higher School of Journalism. This aims to “to change the sociology of newsrooms”, according to Sarah Ichou.
Today, the Bondy Blog management team feels like an editorial team. who we want to silence, but who has not finished telling stories. We are calling for donations, because we refuse to be silenced and want to continue to make the voices of all working-class neighborhoods resonate“, concludes Sarah Ichou.
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