Letter from the editorial team of the Weston Observer

On behalf of the editorial staff of the Weston Observer, we welcome you to this exciting new endeavor.

The first order of business: We love local news! The staff at the Weston Observer, Managing Editor Melissa Russell, Assistant Editor Chris Larabee and reporter Addison Antonoff, do this work because local journalism is our passion. We love becoming part of a community and getting to know the residents, shining light on the best of a town and helping folks understand how their government works. When something is amiss, we dig in and find out why. We’re newshounds. It’s our favorite thing to do.

It’s not news to state that local reporting has been in turmoil for several years. Large companies have shuttered print publications by the hundreds, leaving towns like Weston as virtual news deserts. When there is no local news, citizens can not be informed about impacts to their towns and their wallets, unreliable sources step into the information void and community connections suffer as a result. Without access to local news, voter participation declines, corruption increases and misinformation spreads.

We know there is demand for independent, intelligent reporting. We have seen neighboring towns, including Belmont, Waltham, Winchester and Concord, develop independent news sources through community support, and we know we can do it here.

The Weston Observer is your new source for all the news Weston residents care about. Town government, school news, student achievements, interesting people – the Observer will cover it all, and we will deliver it to your inbox and your mailbox, free of charge.

Why produce a print publication in this digital age? While more and more legacy publications are ditching print in favor of digital platforms, we think it is refreshing to launch a print publication in addition to our website. It is no small thing to print a newspaper at this time in history. Newsprint is expensive. Experienced paginators and printers, their industries decimated by years of layoffs and media closures, are few and far between. But we feel that a print publication is worth the effort. There’s something particularly satisfying in leafing through the pages of the weekly paper and discovering something to pique your interest. And we can all use a little digital detox from time to time.

This has been a true community effort. Starting up a newspaper from scratch means first creating a news company, and over the past two years, that’s just what a team of impassioned volunteers has done. Charlie Cuneo, Marion Packs, Katie Phaneuf, Joel Angiolillo, Tim Armour, Dorothy Bourassa, Ali Dorman Fernandez, Paul Foley, Joan Heilbronner, Sandy Kendall, Alanna Muldoon and Chris Paquin have brought their expertise, passion and enthusiasm, dedicating countless hours to creating the technical and business infrastructure necessary to launch this media company. Jonathan Dowse and Marga Hutcheson are providing valuable technical support, and Stephanie Goldstein is our dogged and friendly advertising representative.

We also owe a debt of gratitude to Tom Caputo, who, after creating the technical system behind the Belmont Voice, shared his expertise with our team. We cannot adequately express how much harder this project would have been without his involvement.

Our editorial advisory board, Jesse Floyd of the Belmont Voice, Betsy Levinson, founding editor of the Concord Bridge; Mary Pratt, founding member of the Waltham Times; and Walter Robinson, editor-at-large at the Boston Globe, will guide our journalism with their experience and expertise.

We believe a healthy local paper serves as a town square, and we invite you to share your thoughts, opinions, interests and ideas. We want to hear from you. Send us your photos, share your celebrations, your letters to the editor and your requests for coverage. And when we get it wrong, we’ll want to hear from you too.

This is an exciting new venture. We look forward to getting started.

Your inaugural news team,

Melissa Russell, Chris Larabee and Addison Antonoff, The Weston Observer