Notes On The News: The 10-second decision to launch a ‘Community’ section

The photo of the downtown cruise dock used for the "About Community and how to contribute" page, just because it’s a colorful shot and something has to appear there. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Independent)

Launching a new section at a corporate newspaper tends to involve a series of group/committee meetings to discuss purpose, content that meets "best practices" goals, and whether the cost/labor is a net plus in terms of revenue/readers.

The Independent launched a "Community" section on Sunday evening after about 10 seconds of consideration and 30 minutes of work, in response to an email about a volunteer group completing some trail work.

"Community" is a shameless ripoff/homage of the "Neighbors" section that used to run in the Juneau Empire — and might again at some point. But it’s no more an actual ripoff — legally speaking — than having a news, opinion, religion or sports section since all are common elements of a community newspaper.

The Neighbors section was supposedly the most popular section of the Empire when I first arrived there during the 1990s. Skipping past the potential jibes about how that reflects on the journalism occurring then, the popularity simply reflects the reality that people like reading about achievements by their neighbors, upcoming events to participate in, and things like wedding and birth announcements. Much of that occurs these days on social media.

The idea of such a section — and others still pending such as sports — was considered while creating the Independent’s website for its June 20 launch. But time above all things meant focusing on the highest-priority sections (news, opinion, etc.) and adding others as time/content warranted.

The lynchpin occurred when an email with a Facebook link to Trail Mix Inc. completing a bridge project on the Treadwell Ditch Trail arrived in the editor’s inbox early Sunday evening. Dozens of emails and text messages suggesting story ideas arrived daily when I was editing the Empire and the same is starting to happen at the Independent, and of course there’s no way a single person (or even a few people) can cover all of them. And, of course, not every item has enough news value to be reported in that section.

But the email about the bridge arrived not all that long after seeing other items such as an announcement about whale-related speed limits in Glacier Bay, a UAS professor being named a Fulbright Scholar, and the usually ongoing collection of public announcements from the City and Borough of Juneau (about July 4 closures, for instance).

So the thought/decision process upon seeing the Trail Mix announcement wasn‘t much more complex than "Hmmm...maybe it’s time to start up the equivalent of a ‘Neighbors’ section."

Coming up with the name took a few more minutes. I suggested to the person who sent the email that "Community" worked OK if there wasn’t a suggestion for something better. The suggested possibility of "Connections" was quickly and mutually discarded since it could be mistaken for a relationship hookup section.

At that point it took about 30 minutes to format, edit and publish a handful of initial posts for the section from a few emails already received and a couple of announcements from the CBJ website. The Trail Mix announcement isn’t among them since a request to republish the photos they shared of the completed bridge is still pending.

While the section consists of content submitted by readers, there are some rules. It can’t be blatantly commercial (a.k.a. free advertising by for-profit operators). And while submissions don’t get the same editing as news stories, there is a general effort to comply with AP style and maintain general neutrality — meaning wording like "most spectacular event of the year," things written in all-caps and exclamation points are likely to be revised.

The good news, so to speak, for people who in the past have been told there wasn’t room for their material on the Empire’s Neighbors page: Since there is at present no actual print pages for the Independent, time constraints of the editor will be the only limiting factor on space available. That said, shorter items with just the essentials are easier to edit and thus far more likely to be published (and in a timely manner).

I’ve been asked about other possible sections including faith/religion, obituaries and arts/entertainment. Those are, to put a twist on my own words, still stuck in committee for the moment.

• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.