It seems like it was only yesterday we were all celebrating the end of 2022 and welcoming 2023 with open arms.
However, in reality it has been 362 days (depending on when you read this) since New Year’s Day.
As I sit at my desk and write the final instalment of this column for 2023, I can’t help but reflect on all of the hard work done by our staff here at Midwestern Newspapers, but also of everyone in the communities we serve.
For our reporters, hundreds of thousands of words – and no, that is not an exaggeration – have been written (sometimes furiously typed in the early hours of the morning to make deadline) about local government, community events, features on the residents that make our communities great, and more. Thousands of kilometres have been travelled as we trekked across the region to record the happenings in our communities.
Midwestern Newspapers received 12 awards at the Ontario Community Newspapers Association’s Better Newspapers Competition in April, a well-deserved pat on the back for our team’s efforts. I truly believe there is no better team in the community newspaper game, and these awards prove that.
However, as I have said in the past, without a subject to write about or event to photograph, there is no news to report or stories to tell.
Our communities are full of service clubs, minor sports and recreation groups, individuals and businesses that are the backbone of those communities. Without them, our recreation facilities and storefronts are just empty buildings, and local parks are just open fields.
For the past 12 months, we have been able to share their stories – successes, failures, milestones and more – which is something that we are fortunate enough to do.
Thank you to all of those who welcomed us into their homes, places of business, community event, and answered the phone when we called to ask some questions.
We would also like to thank those who work in all levels of government, especially municipal, for your co-operation (for the most part) this past year. Same for those working in the emergency response field (police, fire, etc.). Your, for the most part, co-operation when we call or show up on a scene is appreciated.
However, the biggest thank-you goes to our readers and advertisers.
Without readers such as you, who either subscribe to our paper or make the pilgrimage to a local newsstand to pick up a copy each week, there is no Walkerton Herald-Times for us to produce each week.
Our readers are one of the biggest reasons we do what we do. Our goal is to inform and educate members of the public, and thanks to your support, we can do just that.
And thanks to our advertisers, who trust Midwestern Newspapers to relay their branding and messaging, we are able to print the paper each week.
As Gordon Cameron, president of the Ontario Community Newspapers Association, wrote in October during National Newspaper Week, “As the number of journalists goes down, it gets harder for those who remain to write all the stories that need to be written. Fewer stories mean more news items that go unexplained. It means fewer misunderstandings get corrected. It means that those who wish to spin a situation to their own ends will go unchallenged. A lack of journalists and journalism can do irreparable harm to both society at large and to the places we call home.”
With that in mind, thank you to everyone in our community who continue to support Midwestern Newspapers. We hope you enjoy reading the news as much as we enjoy bringing it to you each and every week.
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Mike Wilson is the editor of Midwestern Newspapers. Comments and feedback are welcome at mwilson@midwesternnewspapers.com.
