by Alayne McGregor
Life changed abruptly just after we published the March edition of The Centretown BUZZ.
Within the space of two weeks, all the upcoming shows and events we had featured in the paper were cancelled. The public gatherings we had planned to cover were no more. Basic services like libraries, pools, and community centres closed, and transit ridership slumped. Most stores, except for an increasingly tight definition of essential, were shuttered.
What could go online, or offer takeout or delivery, did; what couldn’t, ended.
Behind the scenes, The BUZZ team debated what to do. We decided we couldn’t put our organizers or volunteer deliverers at risk by asking them to pick up and deliver paper copies.
The solution: to go online with a paper in the same format as we’ve always produced, but available for you to read as a PDF.
Our advertisers were kind enough to continue supporting us, so for now we can afford to pay our basic costs and keep going.
Our regular writers wanted to continue. In fact, we’ve received more articles than usual, including from new contributors.
And there’s lots to write about! The health emergency upended our original article plan, but we quickly adjusted to write about the effects of the emergency on Centretown–and how residents are stepping up to do more.
Central Ottawa has some particular challenges right now: many apartment-dwellers have little access to greenspace; narrower sidewalks and busier roads make it difficult to self-distance while getting necessary healthful exercise; many small business owners and residents with contingent jobs have seen their income dry up; and a higher percentage of homeless people have suddenly lost basic services.
We’ve written about those issues this month. And, for those who need a break from constant COVID-19 coverage, we’ve also included articles and profiles on other useful topics.
The theme of this issue is “Heroes of Centretown”, and you can read about how people here are stepping up to help those least able to cope these days. If you can, consider signing up with the Centretown Community Association (see page 12) to volunteer to help.
As part of our moving online, the BUZZ has also set up a mailimg list so that you know as soon as we’ve published new issue or new articles. Please sign up by emailing subscribe@centretownbuzz.ca. This list will only be used to notify you of BUZZ news, and we promise not to share your details elswhere.
Please let us know what you think of this issue. Could you read it comfortably? Was there something else we should have covered?
We’re always open to your ideas: editor@centretownbuzz.ca