“Community Connections” is an information magazine published in English every two months.
Its volunteer writers cover what is happening in region from Kanesatake to Rosemere, Que.
Reporters cover everything from elections to flood warnings – online and in a printed magazine.
“It’s a place where they can get the current information that’s going on out there,” said Community Connections treasurer Lynda Davis. “We may only be able to publish every two months, but we try and make sure that the website has the current information for everyone.”
For example, the municipality of Deux-Montagnes only publishes its news in French, but Community Connections makes sure the message gets through.
“We don’t have any English in the city,” said editor-in-chief Dave Byers. “They don’t publish anything in English anymore, so we have to go to them and get stuff translated to English.”
“Some people are elderly and they cannot read French or speak French,” said paper CFO Martin Henson. “They get most of the information now from Community Connections.”
Retired educator Gordon Wetmore lives in St-Eustache and covers “School Matters” and nurtures the next generation of writers.
“I’ve got correspondents in each of the high schools,” he said. “Rebecca in Rosemere High School has been with me a couple of years. She’s really good. I’ve got three very eager grade niners in Two Mountains High School and another grade niner at the Kanesatake High School.”
Community Connections president Heather Brown says they’re always looking for new people to join their team.
“If anybody in the community wants to join us as a writer or have their column in the newspaper, we’d be happy to have new people, younger people, to help us,” she said.
Help is always welcome to keep the publication going in its 25th year.
“We’re trying so desperately to get advertising in so that we can cover at least the costs of all the printing because they do mount up,” said Brown. “No one takes a salary, so we definitely need to have either more sponsors or donations, anything that we can get to keep it going.”
Thousands of copies are distributed in the region with readers around the world being able to catch up online.
The next issue comes out early May.
