From the publisher
Welcome to the Friday edition of the Idaho
Mountain Express and Guide.
Seven days is a long time to wait to find
out what’s been going on in the place you live, too long in an age in which news
changes hourly, not just daily.
With the new Friday edition, local readers
won’t have to wait that long anymore. They can get local news, commentary,
features, sports, arts and entertainment twice a week.
News is insistent. Readers want news when
it’s as fresh as possible—not after the story has spent a week or longer
tumbling around in the local rumor mill. They want information when they can use
it, not the week after. They want a variety of information on relevant issues
and events.
How do we know? Readers told us. In recent
years, they resorted to calling us or stopping reporters on the street to try to
find out what was going on when there was breaking local news. Events organizers
and other advertisers expressed frustration about weekly limitations on
marketing promotions.
For seven years, Friday was home to the
Express Weekend Edition published only during the summer and winter high
seasons. When publication ceased each spring and fall in recent years, readers
asked for it and were perplexed about its semi-annual disappearance.
The light features, profiles, events and
entertainment stories that were part of the Weekend edition have been
incorporated into the Friday edition as the Weekend page.
With Blaine County one of the fastest
growing areas in Idaho, a twice-weekly newspaper makes sense. Our permanent
population has surpassed 20,000 people, according to U.S. Census estimates.
News has grown along with the population.
Even though the Wednesday edition of the Express is stuffed full of local news
and events, stories were sometimes delayed because there was simply no room for
them. Relevant regional stories, stories about other mountain towns, notices of
local activities, obituaries and letters to the editor often had to wait.
The Friday edition is a work in progress.
We invite readers to let us know about items they’d like the edition to carry.
Suggestions or comments may be addressed to the postal address or department
e-mail addresses on this page.
For now, the edition is available free at
all valley news racks, but may expand to subscribers and outlying areas in the
future.
The dedicated staff members of the Idaho
Mountain Express and Guide have worked hard to package and bring this new
edition to our readers and advertisers. With it, we reaffirm our commitment to
fair news coverage and service to the valley as its changes.