Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, February 28, 1993 TAG: 9302260015
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: ELIZABETH OBENSHAIN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
CURRENT A DAILY 'RASSLING MATCH
When I run into grizzled newsroom veterans who started their careers in the New River Valley bureau, I realize how rapidly the game has changed here.I hear war stories about reporters and ad salesmen crammed together in a small trailer in the early '70s out in the middle of nowhere at U.S. 460 and Peppers Ferry Road - miles from the closest fast-food outlet.
They had to run next door to the bowling alley for a quick sandwich - or to use the toilets.
New River news stories were spread across a motley collection of inside pages in the Virginia section of the newspaper.
Then our publisher decided we needed a section just for the New River Valley - a tabloid for news, features on local people, community events, listings of all sorts of things from real estate transfers to lunch menus. It would be a bonus section that only New River readers would get.
Wednesday marked the fifth anniversary of the New River Current. We're half a week into our sixth year.
From two harried reporters who staffed that trailer long ago, we've grown to 15 harried reporters, editors, editorial assistants and photographers. Part-time and free-lance writers - some of them former reporters who are dabbling in degrees at Virginia Tech - also add their energies to a staff that crisscrosses the valley looking for the colorful, the unusual, the offbeat.
After the first years, when early pressroom deadlines kept today's news from tomorrow's Current, some fine tuning allowed the section to be printed about 8 p.m. - late enough for all the news except that generated by town councils and supervisors, who love to meet into the wee hours.
So what is our mission in the Current and the other sections of the Roanoke Times & World-News you get each day?
First, our job is to cover any major news event that happens today, whether it is the naming of a new school superintendent or an arsenal blast that rocks the valley.
Our goal is not just to give you the bare details, but to have a staff that can explain the significance of the event. Instead of just reporting the names of the superintendent candidates, we want you to know how they got along with teachers in their previous positions, what their budget and educational philosophies are so you'll have a background for understanding this significant school decision.
Beyond the breaking news, we try to tell you about the trends that are often more significant than one-time news stories in the valley's future. Will Virginia Tech grow in the years ahead or keep its present size, and how will this affect employment in the valley?
Our job also includes those stories we hate to cover - the tragedies, the family grieving for a parent who died in random, senseless violence.
We agonize over these stories, hoping that if we do them right they will not only tell readers the facts they need to know but also comfort the stricken survivors.
Our biggest frustration in covering the valley is that we want to do it all, and can't - short of importing a staff the size of The Washington Post's.
We wrestle daily with how to stretch a staff of six reporters to cover four boards of supervisors, one city council, four town councils, five boards of education, two major universities and a community college, numerous regional and local planning boards, economic development commissions . . . the list goes on and on.
In each locality are folks who feel slighted if we're not there to cover their board or write about their new water system.
As editors and reporters, we'd prefer to cover everything - to be there anytime two elected officials are breathing in the same room. But that takes more man- and womanpower than possible to support with an edition whose circulation is 24,500.
So we have to decide what are the issues, the meetings we must cover - that will affect the lives of most of our readers.
But what has made the New River Current different from our other news sections is that from the start we've tried to give our readers more than just the meetings, the government news. We've peppered the section with feature stories and photographs about the people and events that give this valley its unique character.
A newspaper can be a mirror for a community, giving its readers an image of their neighbors . . . the strawberry farmer in Floyd, the bug scientist at Tech, the adventurous Radford school teachers embracing their new-found friends in Russia.
If we do our jobs, you should know not only the major news and the little details you need to get through a week, but the faces of this valley, too.
We also like to hear from you, our readers . . . both the happy ones and the disgruntled ones.
We've grown and changed a lot in the past 20 years, and we'll have to change a lot faster in the years ahead to answer the needs of you, our readers.
The one certainty I come to work with each day, though, is that putting out a Current every day for the New River Valley is about as much fun as you can have and still get paid for.
Elizabeth Obenshain is the Roanoke Times & World-News' New River editor.