Printed Annual Borough Newsletter

The email version of the Oakland Newsletter has traditionally been published monthly since it was launched as a digital publication, but the Newsletter Committee is currently redesigning it for easier navigation and reorganizing the publication schedule to make their feature articles more accessible. The Oakland Newsletter always includes a minimum of two feature articles, which also live on the Borough website on the Newsletter Committee’s webpage.

In the regular newsletter, the Newsletter Committee reports on the various volunteer organizations and committees that serve the Borough, so you can attend an event, support a cause or get involved with the group. Oakland is full of fascinating people doing extraordinary things, and they are all profiled in the Newsletter. As the Newsletter grows, the Committee is now able to delve into the history and natural beauty of Oakland, which is a lot more interesting than many residents may realize. The Committee has a student reporter inside Indian Hills High School, reporting on the wonderful things our teens are doing. A professional social worker has joined their team, and they now have a monthly Helping Hands column, which introduces free or low-cost resources to help residents in need.

But what happens if you miss something? Maybe someone is new to Oakland and they want to learn more about the community. Residents have been reporting to the Newsletter Committee that they don’t know how to sign up for the newsletter, or didn’t even know we had one, so they might want to catch up. Many people miss hard-copy newspapers and would prefer to read feature articles in print form.

For all these reasons, the Oakland Newsletter Committee is eager to produce an annual hard-copy Year in Review edition, which they envision as an annual end-of-year mailer that highlights the feature articles written throughout the year. This could potentially be done with the annual, town wide, calendar mailer or kept as a separate mailer. This annual publication would be a look back on the news the Committee reported on, the personalities we featured, and the events we covered throughout the year. While the Oakland Newsletter Committee is working on improving their online presence, the Committee is also excited at the idea of curating their favorite articles in a document every resident can hold in their hands, read anywhere and share with their friends.

Designing and disseminating a print publication is labor intensive and costs money. The Newsletter Committee is happy to volunteer to put the Year in Review together, but the printing and costs of producing a mailer are another matter, and this is the kind of project for which Friends of Oakland Communications Commission hopefully can help turn from a dream into a reality.