<div>Chris, </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Thanks for sharing this idea, or more correctly, following up Stuart's earlier message. I am always interested in working more cooperatively with neighboring municipalities and am encouraged when private citizen's do the same. I don't get the exact details about this, but would certainly be interested in exploring the idea further if someone(s) from Riverdale Park became interested enough to follow up on this suggestion. The fact that both you and Stuart feel the model has worked well after two years of operation speaks well for it.
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>An immediate question is would it work with half the readership (Riverdale Park has about half the population of Hyattsville)? Also, is it delivered in the Gazette once?--if so, how are appartments covered? </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Best wishes, </div>
<div> </div>
<div>Vern</div><br><br>
<div><span class="gmail_quote">On 1/26/06, <b class="gmail_sendername">The Curries</b> <<a href="mailto:the.curries@verizon.net">the.curries@verizon.net</a>> wrote:</span>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid">
<div>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">As an interested neighbor in Hyattsville, I followed the TownTalk discussion a couple months ago about the Town Crier and then more recently on ways to improve Town communications with residents. During the earlier conversation, my former City Council colleague Stuart Eisenberg had this to say about Hyattsville's recent experiment in civic communications:
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p><pre><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">"Almost two years ago, some neat, retired Hyattsville businessmen got together to propose the development of an all-volunteer newspaper to the City. They were tired of all the negativism, and lurid headlines in the Gazette, and wanted to focus on positive, real life profiles of residents and organizations. They developed a business model and plan, and presented it to the City Council. Their idea was to propose the monthly publication of the City's Newsletter, 'The Hyattsville Reporter,' as an advertising supplement inserted in the newspaper, through a contract agreement.
</span></font></pre><pre><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></pre><pre><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">"Now, once a month the Reporter is a stand alone mailer printed on distinctive green paper, and once a month it goes in the newspaper. The net result was two-fold. First: the initial contract got the paper on its feet, while it developed an advertising base. Second: the newsletter publication and distribution costs to the City actually lowered. The next year's contract lowered the advertising fee further, and it's possible that eventually this paper might wean itself entirely from its reliance on a City advertising contract, or further lower the publication costs of the newsletter.
</span></font></pre><pre><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></pre><pre><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">"So now, once again we have a local paper, 'The Hyattsville Life & Times.'"
</span></font></pre>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Now nearing the end of its second year of publication, the Life & Times has been a great success from a business perspective, and it's likely that next year's advertising rates for insertion of the City newsletter will fall again. It fills a previously unmet need in local commerce, allowing small businesses an affordable opportunity to reach City residents and those same residents information about the local merchants.
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Moreover, the paper helps build community identity and pride, develop social capital, and create a better informed citizenry. And it allows an outlet for airing viewpoints and telling stories so that the "government organ", the Hyattsville Reporter, can focus on providing information on municipal services, Council actions and City events. The Life & Times tries to steer clear of charges of partisanship by publishing letters and opinion columns by residents and City officials but not endorsing candidates or taking positions of its own on City issues.
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">I think some of the tensions regarding the Town Crier might be eased if some of the creative editors and writers of the Crier were able to direct their energies and talents towards a similar volunteer newspaper in Riverdale Park. I realize that there have been independent newsletters in the Town before, but what I'm proposing is the more synergistic model that Hyattsville has pursued – and one that is financially sustainable.
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">I recently had the opportunity to talk with the business manager of the Life & Times about the conversations I've observed on this listserv. His response was that the Life & Times might well be interested in partnering with an interested group in Riverdale Park to help produce a Riverdale Park newspaper. There would be advantages for both papers in a joint-operations arrangement with separate publications in each City but shared advertising, layout and printing operations. For example, some businesses in each town would likely want to buy space in both publications, while costs of recruiting and producing ads would decrease.
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Also, the combined resources of both papers might make it possible to hire a part-time managing editor to provide increased reliability and sustainability to the publications. However, each publication would have its own governance, policies and standards – each uniquely meeting the needs of its own community.
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">I imagine the Town Council might see some advantages in reduced publication costs for the Town Crier and fewer disputes over content (since non-government communications would appear in the independent newspaper rather than the official town newsletter).
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Would town residents welcome such a newspaper? And if so, would there be volunteers to help edit and write for it? I have no idea of the answers to those questions – only an observation that there seems to be a keen interest in civic communications amongst the members of this list.
</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">I would be interested to see comments about this proposal on this listserv, if there are any. Or anyone may contact Hyattsville Life & Times Business Manager Steve Clements at
<a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:sclements55@earthlink.net" target="_blank">sclements55@earthlink.net</a> to discuss.</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Best wishes for continued success in your community-building efforts –</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Chris Currie</span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p>
<p><font face="Arial" size="2"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"> </span></font></p></div><br>_______________________________________________<br>TownTalk mailing list<br>To post to the list, send mail to
<a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:TownTalk@riverdale-park.org">TownTalk@riverdale-park.org</a><br><a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="mailto:TownTalk-request@riverdale-park.org">
TownTalk-request@riverdale-park.org</a> is for automated subscription processing only<br><a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)" href="http://riverdale-park.org/mailman/listinfo/towntalk_riverdale-park.org" target="_blank">
http://riverdale-park.org/mailman/listinfo/towntalk_riverdale-park.org</a><br><br><br></blockquote></div><br>