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Independent effective communicator

Communication has become more complex than ever. How do you keep in touch with what’s happening in your community and region?

Communication has become more complex than ever. How do you keep in touch with what’s happening in your community and region?

It appears computers and social media have actually made it harder to communicate to send the message out and reach an entire audience.

For generations and decades, community newspapers have played a vital role to be the single source of news from all spectrums of the community, including schools, business, sports and recreation, health, government, churches, arts and culture, agriculture, tourism and anything else that characterizes the community.

For anyone who wants to find out about anything that’s happening in a community, the local newspaper is the one-stop source for it all. I have long said that if it’s not in the newspaper, it’s not important.

Community newspapers like the Stettler Independent, Bashaw Star and Castor Advance cover it all. They remain the best source to relay your message to the entire community.

At a meeting in Bashaw last month, where residents discussed ways to build a better future for the small community, the main issue identified at a previous meeting was the lack of effective communication, even in Bashaw. How can communication be a problem for a town so small?

Residents at the meeting discovered that Bashaw has an anchor newspaper, two community newsletters, a school newsletter and many websites from the town and various organizations. All those options might actually be fragmenting communications and the community to some extent.

Yes, such newsletters and websites can provide valuable information. But usually, people visit a website for something that interests them, so those websites are generally preaching to the converted.

But if an organization wants to expand its audience and convert the unconverted, so to speak, use the newspaper to reach the wider audience.

Most of all, it’s credible. Some groups and organizations wonder why their message isn’t getting to more people via a simple newsletter or website, instead of taking it to the traditional and reliable source of news and events — the community newspaper.

Local newspapers like the Independent focus on being representative of and highlighting all aspects of a community — unlike a newsletter or website that’s just one piece of the pie.

Richard Froese is a municipal reporter with the Stettler Independent. His email address is reporter@stettlerindependent.com