Supporting local stops with the newspaper

If you are reading this, you have either subscribed or have purchased and will hopefully subscribe to this paper and like me, enjoy walking to the mailbox every Thursday to read it. What you are also doing is supporting a local business. A local business that employs local people, reports local news, and advertises fellow local businesses. See the common denominator here? Local.

Much to my chagrin, city staff recommended to our City Council on the January 4th consent agenda that the Pioneer Press be designated as the “official paper” for the city of Hastings for the purpose of publishing public notices as required by law. The cost to utilize the Pioneer Press instead of our local paper is 50-percent more expensive, yet staff still recommended it and cited this difference as ‘minimal’.

I don’t know about you, but I’ll save .10 cents on a gallon of gas if I can and think it’s quite reprehensible that our city leaders who are supposed to be financial stewards of public dollars that you and I pay into, state that a 50-percent increase is ‘minimal’ over choosing our local paper.

The fact that an item such as this made it onto a consent agenda is concerning to me as a resident that has listened to meeting after meeting where Staff and Council Members state “support local”. Thankfully, the item was removed from the Council agenda for further review and my hope is that the tenor of their decision aligns with the mantra our leaders have been telling us since this ‘pandemic’ began.

As a person who has grown up in this town, having served on two advisory commissions most recently as Vice-Chair of the Planning Commission, I am saddened that I’m even having to sit here and pen this opinion. We elect you to be leaders and expect you as leaders to be fiscally responsible and support local whenever possible. This is a vibrant community with a fabulous business base that my wife and I love to support whenever we can. I implore you to do the same as not only a leader but as a resident: support local.

Respectfully submitted, Ian T. Martin