Do You Want To Help Us Celebrate My 25 Years Of Owning The Neighborhood News?

On Monday, I celebrated 25 years as the owner, publisher and editor of the Neighborhood News! 

And of course, even though life is even more hectic than usual these days, you know I can’t let such a milestone go by without some sort of celebration.

To that end, sometime in April (we will announce the actual date in our next issue), the Neighborhood News will host a party at the Bayscape Bistro at Heritage Isles Country Club. We also will (hopefully) be unveiling our new website — NeighborhoodNewsOnline.net (aka the “Online Network for New Tampa and Wesley Chapel”) — at that event and rest assured, there also will be great free hors d’oeuvres, karaoke (it is my party, after all), some nice prize giveaways (also to be announced) and the opportunity to hang with our staff and some of the business owners whose advertising revenue allows us to continue to not only thrive, but also expand the online and video sides of our business, which has now received funding support from the Google News Initiative.

All you have to do to get onto the guest list is email me us ads@ntneighborhoodnews.com, put “Neighborhood News Guest List” in the subject line and give us your first and last name, the community you live in and the names of any people you plan to bring. You’ll receive a confirmation email back from us, which also will serve as your entry into all of our prize drawings that evening (and yes, you must be present to win any of those prizes).

Please note that this event will be held on a Saturday evening and is not really intended for children. For more information,  please call (813) 910-2575 or visit NTNeighborhoodNews.com.

Speaking Of Online…

Since receiving our funding from Google in mid-January, we have recorded two Featured Business videos, our first episode of “Chappie Chatter” (with Wesley Chapel Community Facebook page administrator Jennifer Ames), a North Tampa Bay Chamber news update and our first News Desk of 2019 (photo above left, with co-anchor Susanna Martinez), which is all about everything coming to both sides of 56 near the Tampa Premium Outlets.

We’re pretty proud of the new content, but there is so much more to come and still more ways for your business to get the benefit of not only the primary print voice of the New Tampa and Wesley Chapel communities for the last 25 years, but also of our online video content, as well as our Facebook/Neighborhood News posts that link you to our website, which currently is still NTNeighborhoodNews.com.

As I mentioned before, all of our online content will soon fall under the NeighborhoodNewsOnline.net umbrella and we are now offering your business the opportunity to:

1) Receive our lowest possible print advertising rates

2) Have a Featured Business Video done in conjunction with (and released at around the same time as) your print Business Feature story, just like Florida Executive Realty has in our most recent issue and Samantha Taylor Fitness had last issue

3) Become a sponsor of our online videos and of our “regular” website content

We have sent this information to all of our current, recent past and prospective advertisers, but if you haven’t received yours or you have any additional questions about how it all works, please call (813) 910-2575 or email Ads@WCNT-tv.com.

Congrats, Barry & Trinity Café!

I’ve been telling you for some time now how proud I am to be a member of the Rotary Club of New Tampa Noon, which meets Wednesdays at noon, also at Bayscape Bistro.

I’ve called our club of fewer than 25 members “Small, But Mighty” in previous editorials and I have more proof of that to tell you about.

Not only did our club win awards from our Rotary District 6890 for our increase in membership and for per-person contributions to the Rotary Foundation (the nonprofit wing of Rotary International that has been the primary force behind the drive to eradicate polio from the world), we also recently held a hugely successful, first-ever New Tampa Brewfest in November (the 2019 Brewfest already is scheduled for Saturday, November 16; visit NewTampaBrewfest.com for tickets and details).

And now, club member Barry Shuman and his wife (and chauffeur) Claire have helped the Trinity Café, a program of Feeding Tampa Bay, raise a record $9,000 at last month’s annual Outrageous (and super-fun) Bingo event held at Hamburger Mary’s in Brandon.

Barry (far left in right photo), who was this year’s event chair, and Claire were on hand at our Feb. 13 Rotary meeting when our current club president Gary Lefebvre (right) presented Trinity Café executive director Mandy Cloninger (center) with checks totalling an additional $1,000 from not only our club, but also from past president Vinnie Kudva and Sergeant-at-Arms Scott Hileman, who donated the proceeds from the recent opening day of the Tampa Nekter Juice Bar he has opened with business partner Brian Erwine (their second location). 

Small, but mighty, indeed!