Southern Voice gets $12,000 matching grant for new gay publication

An Atlanta foundation has given a $12,000 matching grant to help create a new gay publication since Southern Voice closed last week.

The Lloyd E. Russell Foundation will give $12,000 in matching funds to the new news outlet, according to a note posted on www.savesovo.com

Gay activist and businessman Lloyd Russell was active in Atlanta politics as a Libertarian candidate in the 1990s. His nonprofit was started to support the gay community in Atlanta and in the Southeast.

The foundation does not hold fundraisers or accept outside contributions, its Website said. It distributes grants to individuals at its discretion. But, it also has started a program where people, agencies and organizations can request funds for specific purposes.

The money will help Chris Cash, who founded Southern Voice in 1988, and  former SoVo editor Laura Douglas-Brown start a new gay publication.

“I was upset for about two hours,” said Cash, who sold Southern Voice to Window Media and Unite Media in 1997, when she learned last Monday that the publication had closed after 21 years. The companies, the nation’s largest publisher of gay publications, closed Nov. 13 and filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy – complete liquidation – in Northern District of Georgia – last Friday.

“That’s about how much time I had to be upset before my mind clicked to, ‘What now,’ which is the most important thing,” said Cash, who now lives in Texas.

They started a Web site, www.savesovo.com where Douglas-Brown posted a letter asking for donations and ideas for a new publication, which would be online and in print, she said.

Money has come from former employees, people in the community as well as some people who have been the subject of Southern Voice articles, Douglas-Brown said.

“It became so clear in such a short period of time how much this publication was needed,” she said.

The initial finances will only go so far, Cash told ajc.com Monday. It’s to pay for an office, printing costs and equipment. The money will not go to pay salaries, she said.

‘This is purely to get us set up,” she said.

Cash said she’s working with an attorney to form a corporation. Once that happens, they can start selling shares, she said.

The goal is to raise enough money to stay in business for one year regardless of ad sales, but Cash said she’s confident that they will be able to do that.

“We’re walking this thin line of putting things in place so we can get out the door solidly but get out the door as fast as we can,” she said. “It’s a tight rope that we’ve been walking, but I totally and completely believe that it is possible.”

The two are holding a meeting next week. They were working Monday to secure a time and location. Besides forming ideas for the new publication, Douglas-Brown said they will seek suggestions for its name.

Window Media LLC closed SoVo and a handful of other gay publications nationwide a week ago, after years of struggling financially and being forced into receivership earlier this year by the Small Business Administration.

Many staffers didn't find out about the closing until they arrived at the paper's office off Briarcliff Road early Monday to find the door locked and a sign posted on the front: "It is with great regret that we must inform you that effective immediately, the operations of Window Media LLC and Unite Media LLC have closed down."

The staff met for the last time at the Zonolite Road offices last Wednesday. Douglas-Brown said staffers were told they would become part of the company’s creditors. They are owed four weeks’ pay, something that Douglas-Brown said she’s not optimistic anyone would get.

Window and Unite list the Zonolite Road offices as their headquarters, bankruptcy filings show.

Window Media lists 277 secured and unsecured creditors in its 94-page court filing. The company's claims include back taxes, salaries to employees and freelancers as well as in back rent, payments to health insurers, lawyers and printers, the documents show.

Window has a $46,000 rent claim to Zonolite Road Properties LLC and $1,314 claim to DeKalb County in taxes, the filing says. The company also has a $6,024 claim to the Georgia Department of Labor in payroll taxes.