How we work

Editorial standards

Public trust depends on showing our work. These are the rules every investigation on thevibe.city follows.

How we choose investigations

The matter involves public money, public property, or a public decision made by Long Beach officials or agencies.
There is a documented gap between what residents were told and what the records show.
Primary sources exist—agendas, contracts, audits, court filings, or recorded meetings—that anyone can check.
We do not investigate private individuals who hold no public role or contract.

Every claim, timeline entry and dollar figure carries its own evidence label and links to the source it rests on. One verified document does not make a whole investigation verified.
A source is marked “Verified” only after we open the exact document and confirm it says what we cite it for. A working link alone is not verification.
If we cannot find the exact document, we say so (“Exact document not located”). We never substitute an agency homepage.
Projections, requests, approvals and actual spending are shown as separate categories and never added together. Our own calculations are labelled and show their inputs.
Anonymous tips are never published on their own. They are a starting point for records requests.

First: official agendas, staff reports, signed agreements, invoices, audited financial statements, court filings and meeting video.
Second: independent news reporting, clearly marked as secondary. We say when a point rests only on reporting.
Company or advocacy statements are treated as claims by that party, not as findings.

Lawsuit claims, whistleblower accounts and anonymous complaints are labelled as allegations and attributed to who made them.
We separate accounting or audit findings, court rulings and official records from what someone alleges.
We do not assert wrongdoing, favoritism or causation without evidence that supports it.

Each investigation says plainly whether we have asked the people involved for a response yet. We do not imply someone declined to comment unless that is documented.
Responses we receive are published in full or quoted fairly in the “Responses” section, with the date.
Responses quoted from other publications are marked “as reported.”
Officials and agencies can send statements at any time to odd.cross3538@fastmail.com.

Errors are fixed promptly and logged with a date in the investigation's “Corrections” section.
We never silently change a published claim.
Anyone may request a correction by emailing us; include the claim, the page, and a supporting document if you have one. We reply by email and log material changes on the page.

The tip form has no database. It opens a pre-filled message in your own email program; nothing is stored on this website.
We never publish a tipster’s name or contact details without their permission.
Private submissions are not shared outside the people checking the tip.

Verified by primary records: Confirmed against an official document we opened and checked.
Supported by secondary reporting: Rests on news or other secondary reporting; the underlying record has not yet been checked by us.
Calculation requires verification: Our own arithmetic or an estimate whose inputs still need confirming.
Disputed or unresolved: Competing accounts or interpretations, or an open allegation.
Records needed: We need a record to answer this. Shown as “Records requested” only once a request is actually filed.
Corrected: Replaces something we previously got wrong.
Not yet verified: Stated but not yet checked against any source.

We do not use numerical credibility scores.