As a second-home owner in the valley I look forward to mail on Mondays with The Deerfield Valley News. There is always a lot happening and it’s more interesting than my local newspaper.
We all have a love affair with the valley and have felt the pain caused by Irene. The second anniversary of the flood struck me very strong. Nothing was mentioned in The Deerfield Valley News of the struggles and sacrifices of a number of Wilmington business owners, yet Dot’s was again centrally mentioned. Shopkeepers and other restaurateurs who “pulled it together on their own” and are back in business must be enraged by the continued focus on Dot’s. Even The Deerfield Valley News seems to have a love affair with Dot’s, as it’s been the focus of many articles in the past year.
There are other businesses in Wilmington, aren’t there? What other business in Wilmington did the governor visit, besides Dot’s ?
Yes, the Reagans have struggled but they’ve gotten help. How many business owners dipped into their own pockets and are back in business creating what we love in Wilmington?
How about feature stories on them to create fair and balanced reporting.
Thank you for listening.
Art Dulik,
Long Island, NY
I am the Chairperson of a schoolboard in a town within the district and have on numerous occasions attempted to get articles printed concerning achievements and awards granted to our school. Our Principal applied for , and received a grant from Lowe's in the amount of $5,000 to be used for security purposes and several attempts to have an article on this has failed. Recently, our school was named as one of the three elementary schools in the district that succeeded in achieving AYP in the first year of the multi-year plan and we supplied the paper with the article from the DOE citing this accomplishment and again, no coverage whatsoever. The excuse was the reporting of scoring can be taken in many ways and not an exact account of achievement.
In the last several weeks, the Valley News has covered "new hires" ( as they do every year), but for some reason there was no coverage of new hires in surrounding districts except the Principal's position in Halifax.
BUT, the paper is loaded with "filler articles" of a more local flavor.
For people such as yourself, who live afar, who obviously have a concern for events and happenings in the valley, I can sense the frustration.
Maybe the paper should consider renaming it the Wilmington News instead of the Deerfield Valley News?