HEADS UP! The next 75 people to sign up as monthly Sprawl members for $12/mo (or more) will get my book The Hollowing of the Calgary Herald in the mail. Support our journalism and snag a copy before they're gone! More details below.

I have been deep in the Sprawlcast salt mines this week, working on the next episode.

But I want to set that down for a moment to share some exciting news. The Alberta Magazine Awards finalists were announced this week and The Sprawl is a finalist in seven categories, including Magazine of the Year!

Meghan Lett is nominated in the Emerging Writer category for her Sprawlcast episode on the challenges of growing Calgary's tree canopy (City of Trees: The Story and Struggle of Calgary's Urban Forest). Meghan is also nominated in the Feature Writing Long category for the same piece.

I still have people regularly tell me how much they appreciated Meghan's tree story—including, on Thursday, another journalist from a national news outlet.

We are re-upping Meghan's piece today as it is an evergreen story if there ever was one! You can listen or read, as you prefer.

And then there's our municipal election coverage.

In November 2024, nearly a year before the election, we started an online candidate list, which Kelsea Arnett and I updated regularly. Then, last summer, our designer Chris Pecora and cartoonist Sam Hester took that list and created a colourful series of eye-catching zines—one for each of the city's 14 wards, plus mayor.

In the fall, during the campaign, our roving election reporter, Asad Chishti, doggedly got these resources into the hands of Calgarians. And we partnered with the Calgary Public Library so this voter information could be easily accessible in branches across the city.

After all that work by a superb team, I'm proud to see that our election zines are nominated in three categories: Service Journalism, Editorial Package Print and Feature Design.

Last but not least, The Sprawl's Pop-Up Press, our mobile printing operation, is a finalist in the Innovation Award category.

Winners will be announced in Calgary in September. Wish us luck!

Speaking of the Pop-Up Press, thanks to all who came out on Sunday to our pop-up by the river with local cartoonist Teresa Wong, author of All Our Ordinary Stories.

Teresa drew a storied Chinatown storefront specifically for this gathering, and was on hand to sign prints of her illustration—"hot off the press!"

Afterward, Teresa mentioned that being there helped restore some of her faith in humanity. I feel similarly every time I take the press out and meet people with it. Making something together, in person, is a heartening antidote to doomscrolling.

But to do all of this work, we need local support.

To this end, we're doing a June fundraiser for The Sprawl. The next 75 people to sign up as monthly Sprawl members at $12/mo (or more) will get a copy of my book The Hollowing Of The Calgary Herald. 

This is the print version of an epic Sprawlcast episode that originally aired in 2023. It's a snazzy little volume, complete with a letterpress-printed band and bright Sprawl-green paper. Each copy is signed by me.

I've been a little slack on fundraising lately—to The Sprawl's detriment. Here is something many people don't realize: As of 2026, The Sprawl is entirely reliant on crowdfunding.

In other words, other than the odd printing gig that I can get payment for, all of our revenue comes from readers and listeners. Not ads. Not grants. People like you. The people we do this work for.

This model works well for The Sprawl. It means we're truly independent—and laser-focused on serving Calgarians with local journalism that they find interesting and valuable. And so they support us financially. Not because they have to (none of our stories are paywalled), but because they want to.

But life happens. People lose jobs. People move away. People who want to keep supporting us sometimes have to stop for a variety of reasons.

The reality is we need others to step in and fill those gaps. (Sign up here!) Monthly support is recurring revenue that we can plan with and count on. 

This is why I'm asking for your support of all the good work described above. And the good work still to come. Including the deep-dive Sprawlcast episode I'm working on as we speak!

I've got 75 copies of my book up for grabs and once they're gone, they're gone.

If you'd rather support us at a lower monthly level or with a one-time donation, we welcome that too—and have some goodies for you as well! We'll pop a sticker pack into the mail for you.

But the main reason to support our work is because Calgary is a better place with The Sprawl than without it. I hope you agree.

Thanks for reading—and don't forget to mash that support button!

Jeremy Klaszus is founder and editor of The Sprawl.