Jan 21 - 28 (5)

Friday, January 26, 2007
Did your plants die in the big freeze?
If you have a yard like mine, chances are you had some, or perhaps many, plants that got burned in the past few weeks with the bone-chilling cold temperatures. So I was delighted to read our useful advice in today's Home supplement. It addresses whether home gardeners should trim out the dead stuff. Here's a tease: The answer might surprise you.Bringing you useful information is what we try to do on a daily basis. Let us know whether you find information regularly in The Tribune or our Web site that helps you with real-world problems. If we are falling short, we'd be really interested to know how so and how we can do better._ Tad Weber
Posted by Tad Weber at 9:33 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Thursday, January 25, 2007

What do we do well and what can we improve?
From time to time we receive praise from readers, which, you might imagine, we are delighted to get!Here are two that arrived this morning:Llyn Hunter from Atascadero wrote to thank us for reporter Stephen Curran’s coverage of the Del Rio road property in Atascadero – and what that might mean for Wal-Mart. “For the most part, the article was non- partial, informative, and a very good piece of journalism. As a citizen of Atascadero I appreciated the concise way it was written.”Another individual left a voice mail, congratulating us on our efforts the past year to include more thought-provoking information in The Tribune. “Now you have enough columnists, world news, business news, where I can spend almost an hour reading your paper’’ every day. “And I really appreciate that. It is changing for the better.”My response to both? Thanks for contacting us. And yes, we will continue to break news and offer valuable perspective on the Del Rio road property in Atascadero, along with other issues. And yes, our intent is to continue giving readers relevant, informative information on both local and key national and world news.Does anyone else want to weigh in? Tell us what we do well, and what we could improve.Thanks, Sandy
Posted by Jeff Ballinger at 12:59 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Wednesday, January 24, 2007

State of the Union
One of the more challenging news events for us to cover each year in the president's State of the Union speech. That's because if you care about it, chances are you watched it live. So simply rehashing what the president said in next morning's paper offers no new insights to readers. To give you deeper background and analysis, we chose to lead our coverage today with a New York Times story that provides what the president said, but puts into context the political realities he must now confront, given that Congress is controlled by the Democrats. We'd value knowing whether you think this story was helpful to you. Participate in this blog to let us know.Also, don't miss the local reactions to the speech that we rounded up. We have our two congressional representatives, as well as several other residents, who answered the question, what one thing should President Bush and Congress accomplish in the coming year. The responses are interesting._ Tad Weber
Posted by Tad Weber at 9:52 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Why pay for a seminar in English when it’s free in Spanish?
We received about three letters Monday from readers wanting to make sure we were correct in noting that a Feb. 10 seminar conducted in Spanish on the life of elephant seals would be free while the same seminar conducted in English would cost participants $5. And if we were correct, they said they found it offensive that they’d have to pay to hear a lecture in their own language.For the record, our reporting was accurate. Reporter Kathe Tanner believes the distinction is to encourage Latinos to attend the event. Note what was said in an e-mail sent her by Chris Cameron, director of Camp Ocean Pines, which is sponsoring the lecture:“The real story is the outreach effort to the Latino community by flying up a leading Mexican researcher from La Paz! Dr. David Aurioles has studied under Dr. Burney Le Boeuf from UC Santa Cruz, and has become an expert in his own right! … The elephant seals were saved from extinction on Guadalupe Island in Mexico. My hope is that we can encourage the Latino audience by presenting the elephant seal story totally in Spanish from a leading Mexican professor!”--Sandra Duerr
Posted by Jeff Ballinger at 10:10 AM 1 comments Links to this post
Monday, January 22, 2007

Is our new stocks page working for you?
Corinne Patrick of Atascadero wrote over the weekend that she’d like us to publish an article daily that summarizes the previous day’s stock market – much like we used to do on our old stocks page in the upper right-hand corner. Our new markets page actually does include yesterday’s Stocks in Review in the same spot on the page. It’s more condensed, however, and highlights six companies that were in the news that day. While I’m on the subject of our stocks page, let me ask everyone a question: Is anyone reading our new Money & Markets page that replaced the old stocks page Tuesday through Friday? Please let me know either way … and tell me what information you like or don’t like.Thanks,Sandy!
Posted by Jeff Ballinger at 2:08 PM 0 comments Links to this post
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