Readers of the print edition of the RoundTable couldn’t miss the usual photo of someone reading this paper in different places around the world: Paris, Egypt, Antarctica, the Great Wall of China, Machu Picchu, Australia, etc., and destination spots all across America. The entire staff has been very proud of our paper’s reach. What has really mattered, though, is how the RoundTable has covered and touched the many worlds of Evanston itself.
Every other Thursday for almost all of the last 21 years this hands-on paper has been a staple for our community, “covering what matters since 1998,” voicing the values and concerns that impact and shape our lives. From its beginnings, it has sought transparency and accountability on every level of Evanston’s reality.
City government, especially. And school administration, students’ academic challenges and achievements; police and fire department procedures, problems and vital presence; business growth – encouragement and recognition; arts and culture, both town’s and University’s; neighborhoods, their character, diversity and needs; and the constant stresses of change and progress – all with a focus on social justice and bettering, ever bettering what truly matters.
The printed bi-weekly could not have happened without the support of the RoundTable’s advertisers and its staff’s commitment to the vision of its editors.
Real, not fake news (except, with tongue in cheek, on April 1st). Free and delivered. And forthright opinion – in editorials, guest essays and community forum.
None of that will diminish in quality as the RoundTable transitions from paper to digital copy. For many of its readers, not having a newspaper in hand will be a loss. But the economics of providing that pleasure after this edition simply does not work any longer. So our paper, like too many of its advertisers, is going digital.
Fortunately, evanstonroundtable.com has had a home on the Internet almost as long as the paper edition has been landing on our residents’ doorsteps. Be assured that its editors and staff will continue their commitment to cover “what matters most” in the digital format.
On a personal note, I am grateful for all that the RoundTable and its staff mean to me. I have written that “change is the Universe breathing” and believe that this transition will reshape and amplify for the future an already familiar and necessary voice for our community – a voice I am proud to be a small part of.
Evanstonroundtable.com is alive and well at your fingertips, if no longer on your doorstep. Check in often; add your voice. And thank you for being the most important element of our efforts.