This summer, Real Change needs to get ahead. Over the years, this newspaper has built an amazing base of support in our readership. Last year, more than 1,000 people contributed more than $245,000. About 45 percent of our budget comes directly from reader support, and every bit of it matters.

Our content is driven by readers, not advertisers. If you want entertainment journalism about things to eat, watch, and buy, there are several other local papers who have that niche covered. If you want to know about your community and how you can be part of the quiet revolution that is taking place everyday, you read Real Change.

Your support allowed us to expand to weekly publication two years ago. Since then, our circulation has grown by 30 percent. We’ve broadened our readership and created more success for our vendors.

Without reader support, our work of building an activist base to fight poverty would be impossible. Real Change has a remarkable track record of taking on issues, engaging our activist base, and winning.

This community needs Real Change. And we need this community to support our work.

This is a time of remarkable change; enormous things are at stake.

On the one hand, right-wing over-reach has led to the election of progressive majorities, both locally and nationally. The environmental movement and concern with global warming has turned a corner, and is now a mainstream concern. Poverty is rising on the national agenda. Here in Seattle, homelessness has been identified as our number three issue, behind transportation and education.

At the same time, Seattle is becoming increasingly unaffordable as higher-income professionals and those who have wealth flood our housing market. Inequality is at its greatest since the Roaring Twenties. The wealthiest 1 percent in the U.S. earned the same in 2005 as the bottom 50 percent of the population. That’s an unbelievable one to five-hundred income ratio.

These are not the conditions that foster democracy.

Our major media is corporate-owned and increasingly trivial. Our politics are dominated by the power of wealth. A culture of fear divides and intimidates us.

The one thing that can reverse these trends is a vibrant culture of grassroots organizing and community building. Real Change is one of the key supports for the very big tent that is Seattle’s progressive community. We need your help now to bring ourselves up to speed.

Last year, our budget of $535,000 paid for weekly publication of a quality progressive newspaper, support staff for more than 800 homeless and low-income vendors, and organizing staff that, among other things, raised the bar for downtown developers’ support of affordable housing.

Our work is bigger than our budget. We ended the year in the red.

This year, we need to expand our organizing staff, consolidate our newspaper staff, and shore up our administrative capacity.

We have set a very big fundraising goal of $140,000 for our summer campaign.

Our first week brought in, $7,311. Last week nearly doubled that to bring in another $13,971. We hope to step things up over the next few weeks to be at least halfway to our goal by the end of May.

Here’s what will make the difference. We need those of you who know how important Real Change is to this community to take the 20/20 Challenge. By asking 20 of your friends to donate $20 to our work, you help us meet our immediate goal of raising $140,000 while you broaden our circle of friends for the long haul.

At our Web site, www.realchangenews.org, you will find the tools you need to make this easier. There are cards to download and print. There is an email postcard form to send your friends. There is a secure on-line donation service that makes giving easy.

By clicking on the 20/20 card on our Web site’s front page, you will be taken to more information about our goals and how you can help. Thanks for your help. Real Change needs every single friend we can get.