Monarch Butterflies at Ardenwood Garden Tours at the Botanic Garden Alamo • Danville • Blackhawk • Diablo • San Ramon
Valley
The
Sentinel
The Art of Gyotaku at Crab Cove
Look inside for the latest ... plus more activities for everyone Regional Nature in Your Regional in Parks! Activity Guide!
Bird Watching & Volunteer Activities
always for the community VOL 20, NO 2 February 2015
www.valleysentinel.com
SPOTLIGHT
Steve Simpkins Matt Snyder Pete Villa
Matt Snyder from California High School wins the 2014 Pete Villa Award The Rotary Club of Danville held its 18th annual Pete Villa awards luncheon on Monday, December 15th. The winner was Matt Snyder from California High School. The award, named
ECRWSS
PRESORTED STANDARD US POSTAGE PAID DANVILLE, CA PERMIT NO. 70
See AWARD page 4
View of Carquinez Strait from the East Bay Regional Park Franklin Ridge Trail near Martinez. Please see page 15 for information about the 2015 EBRPD Trails Challenge: Photo by Marc Crumpler.
New newspaper group unfolds in East Bay the Pleasant Hill-based paper
Postal Customer
By Peggy Spear
Sentinel Newspapers, Inc. 390 Diablo Road, Ste. 145 Danville, CA 94526 925-820-6047
The media landscape in the East Bay is shifting again, as five local community papers are banding together to create the new Contra Costa Community News Group. Publishers from the Clayton Pioneer, Concord Pioneer, Lamorinda Weekly, Community Focus and Valley Sentinel launched the new CCCNG late in 2014, mainly to provide a more cost effective alternative to national and regional advertisers. The combined circulation of the new enterprise is 150,000 copies delivered to homes and businesses in central Contra Costa County. But the founders of the new association say the end result will be better coverage for readers. “CCCNG can help strengthen our community newspapers with added revenue,” says Community Focus publisher Elena Hutslar, who runs
with Jennifer Neys and Rebecca Coburn. That revenue, according to Pioneer Editor and Publisher Tamara Steiner, will result in better papers. “More revenue means more resources for more and better news coverage.” Wendy Scheck, associate publisher of the Lamorinda Weekly, agrees. “All of our papers are written and printed with significant costs and delivered free to homes and businesses in each of our communities. By forming this group and making it easier and more efficient for regional and national advertisers to place media buys with us, our newspapers will be stronger financially — and that means we can continue providing the
Tamara Steiner, Rebecca Coburn, Elena Hutslar, Denise Rousset, Wendy Scheck, and Jennifer Neys
local coverage our readers have grown accustomed to.” The Lamorinda Weekly debuted in March, 2007. Each of the papers will continue to cover local stories in their communities, with
This month’s Special Section:
Senior Services pages 7-9
little or no overlap in news coverage. The nearly six-yearold Community Focus will also expand its coverage to include Walnut Creek. See NEWS GROUP page 5