A look back at 2009, from your perspective and mine
By Kyra Hoggan
I was out and about in Castlegar, chatting with locals, being snoopy, asking questions and generally not minding my own business … you know, the usual … when I asked a fellow what he’s most excited about for 2010.
“It’s not 2009,” he said.
I take his point.
Let’s face it, ’09 was not an easy year for many of us … in fact, it often felt like we spent the final year of this decade heading from crisis to calamity: personally, professionally, as a city, a province, a country, a global community.
The City of Castlegar took it in the teeth on several fronts, the most notable being Celgar’s refusal to pay its $3.6-million municipal tax bill and the city’s subsequent conflict with the Regional District of Central Kootenay (RDCK) …but there was also the delay of the gaming centre, the closure of the B.C. Hydro dam road, the burning of the Woodland Park Elementary School (and the fight that followed over site clean-up). On the upside, the city launched a new website, achieved some common ground with Celgar, developed a new tagline, got a new top cop to take command of the local RCMP detachment, created a new RCMP Crime Reduction Unit.
The difficulty with ’09 maybe wasn’t that all the news was bad …it was that there was simply too much of it.
I ought to know … my own life mirrored that of my city’s.
A roller-coaster ride of ups and downs, ’09 saw me, at its outset, firmly ensconced at the helm of the Castlegar Current … until the global economic downturn forced the Current to close. Yikes!
Nothing daunted, I started up the Castlegar Source … an avowed technophobe launching an on-line media outlet. Double yikes!
I can certainly say it has been an education … achieved primarily through the auspices of the School of Hard Knocks.
Who knew that ‘stirring the pot’ (opposing the legalization of marijuana) is, in the Kootenays, similar to advocating the killing of puppies, kittens, and all things good in the world? Hundreds of emails, copious hate mail … yup, a learning experience, for sure. As I said back then, I thought pot was supposed to make a person mellow?
The new web-based paradigm even forced me to learn new social media applications like Facebook (this next decade will, I’m sure, be marked by myriad new 12-step groups for Farmville addicts). We even had a rape story break through Facebook …it’s a Brave New World, indeed.
It has been fun, though – I was never able, through traditional print newspapers, to gauge reader interest from story to story. The only measure we had of public interest was public response … and people generally only write in to newspapers when they’re mad about something.
Now, however, I can see exactly how many people read a given story, and rely not just on a “nose for news” but on actual readership numbers when tailoring content for The Source.
I didn’t always agree with Reader’s Choice selections (I loved the baby squirrel story, while readers gravitated to the deer copulation piece – journalism at its finest. Although, in fairness, I’ll confess I told all my friends about the deer article, too).
Perhaps one of the best parts of getting to know you, Dear Reader, better (especially given how tough this past year really was), was seeing I wasn’t alone – you had trials and tribulations, too. Both the Number One and Number Two Reader’s Choice picks for the entire lifespan of The Source were mine and Rob’s columns on Swine Flu. You also followed the city’s plans for a utility hike, potential school closures in Castlegar, and the pesticide debate that continues to challenge the city’s civic works department. None of us were without our concerns this year … which means we were kind of all in it together.
And if that knowledge was comforting, I was flat-out thrilled to see you still had attention to spare for the good news stories the publishers of my past so often dismissed as “not sexy enough”.
You cared that a Castlegar child was given a bravery award from the Governor General, you took the time to read about a dog being rescued from a dumpster, you even laughed with the local Chamber of Commerce as they revealed their “X-files” to public eyes for the first time.
Best of all, you haven’t lost your sense of magic – the second most popular Reader’s Choice material for 2009, after the Swine Flu editorials, was this year’s interview with Santa. It’s good to know that, despite 2009’s turmoil, the big guy’s still got juice.
So 2009 wasn’t all wet, after all.
Maybe 2010 will bring with it, for all of us, smoother sailing – no more crashing Currents, at least. But regardless whether we face rough water, rising crests or plummeting troughs, it’s good to know we’ll ride the wave together.
I wish you all the best, Dear Reader, for 2010, and promise we’ll do our part to help keep Castlegar afloat and on course by providing your news … straight from The Source.
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