We are grateful to live in a community committed to reaching out a helping hand to our neighbors. Ours is a community that steps up with basic monetary support and, from ears of corn to ceramic bowls to winter coats, finds constructive and creative ways to offer help.
We encourage children and youth to pick up a tasty and healthy lunch bag, available at the Charlotte Congregational Church, Spear’s Corner Store and the Charlotte Library. Kudos to the people preparing these bags. Clearly, they put a lot of research into the contents, finding things that will keep without refrigeration, things that are healthful, and things that kids will like. Here’s what a sample lunch bag contains: organic juice drink, Goldfish, Cup Noodles, Vermont Beef & Pork stick, packaged pear bits with juice, granola bar.
To bring you The Charlotte News every two weeks throughout the year we depend on three sources of support: the businesses that regularly advertise with us, the volunteer writers and photographers who provide content for the paper and, importantly, the donors who contribute to our annual fundraising campaigns.
I know I have mentioned this in several different ways since I arrived back here a few months ago, but I wanted to make some things clear, believing that there are readers who harbor misconceptions about the nature of the operations of The News. As has been made abundantly clear by our recent celebratory “ads,” the paper was founded 60 years ago in the basement of the Congregational Church by several enterprising teenagers and the indefatigable Nancy Wood. This newspaper is a nonprofit enterprise, relying on advertising dollars and fundraising efforts to keep the presses rolling. Almost all of the contributors—writers and photographers—do so without compensation, and the staff members receive salaries that would probably make you laugh.
During Easter week what you have is a news editor with very few words. Or, rather, a pastor with a lot going on. Also, while I’m sitting here feeling a little lacking in vision, let me mention that one of us three hospice chaplains who cover hundreds of Vermont miles is out with a broken arm, and I have two papers to write for my Fordham classes.
All of us at The News extend our best wishes to our readers and advertisers for a happy holiday and New Year. Thanks for your wonderful support in 2017—see you again on January 10, 2018.
The Vermont Women’s Fund (VWF) is making funding available for new or existing projects, programs and efforts that support viable career pathways and career prospects for Vermont women and girls.