Northeast News
November 18, 2015

Dear Editor,

I just want to say I’m disappointed in the Northeast News for their lack of coverage on Scare-It Halloween this year. This was the 22nd annual event that brings in more people in three hours to the Historic Northeast than probably all other events throughout the year combined. Not only is it a very positive marketing venue for our neighborhood, it provides thousands of kids a safe and very special Halloween environment that the entire family can enjoy together.

It also promotes and highlights what special and dedicated neighbors we have…with over 20 home owners volunteering to participate, along with dozens of other neighbors volunteering to help with the event in many different ways. It also brings together many of our local businesses who donate money, merchandise and time to sponsor the event, as well as full support and involvement of Parks and Rec, City of KC, KC Museum, KCPD, KCFD and The Neighborhood Tourist Development Fund [NTDF], and Scarritt Renaissance Neighborhood Association.

This year we even had Mayor James come to the event…not because it was a re-election year, but just because he wanted to experience our event and support what we do for this great city and our neighborhood in particular. This is the first time I have ever seen our mayor at the event. It would have been nice to have city-wide media coverage, since they only appear to show-up for negative events in our area…but even more disappointed for the local media for their noticed absence of coverage.

Lisa Donnici stepped up to chair the event this year, and lead a small team of dedicated committee members to not only pull off a successful event, but to make it be what I felt in my eight years of living here the best Scare-It Halloween ever!

So Kudos to Lisa and her team, kudos to all the area merchants, organizations and neighbors who volunteered and supported…and kudos to the 5,000 plus who came and joined our neighborhood that evening! And shame on Northeast News for their lack of coverage.

Jeff Zumsteg,

Northeast resident

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Publisher’s Response

Sometimes, we drop the ball. This was one of those times. We can’t be everywhere all the time, but this time, with two of the community’s biggest events, we didn’t follow through with news updates and pictures on our website or in our print product. For that, we apologize. Additionally, this issue has prompted us to review our news delivery paradigm. Today, newspapers walk a fine line of web content versus print content. We’re obviously bound by space restrictions in the print edition where as the web product isn’t as restrictive. Moving forward, look for more news stories posted to our website, as well as breaking news updates posted to our newspaper’s Facebook page. We take pride in shouldering the responsibility for being Historic Northeast’s primary news voice.