Stacy Wolford: Reflecting on 10 years at the MVI, and a lifetime of memories

By STACY WOLFORD
Managing Editor
swolford@yourmvi.com

While we celebrate the 250th year of our country this year, here at the Mon Valley Independent we will be celebrating our own milestone, too.

STACY WOLFORD Managing Editor

The Mon Valley Independent will mark its 10th anniversary on May 2 — a remarkable feat considering the print media landscape sadly continues to decline across the country.

Ten years and more than 3,000 editions later, we are proud that we have defied the odds and continue to publish not only a print edition, but also an expanded electronic edition.

Not only is this our 10th year, but it is also my 30th year working as a full-time journalist, having started my career as an intern and a reporter at our predecessor, The Valley Independent. I still have my first trusty Smith Corona typewriter my Mom bought me when I became editor of my newspaper at Bentworth High School. I’ve been hooked ever since.

I’m proud to say I’m among the last of the old-school reporters who remember the days of taking notes by hand, watching my editors use the old typesetting system to paste and glue copy onto pages and using an old fashioned phone book to track someone down. I remember being out “in the field” searching for a pay phone to call into the newsroom to dictate stories, because that was the only way to get them in the paper on deadline.

The Valley Independent’s storied history dates back to 1902. There were several owners over the years, with Trib Total Media being the last one, acquiring the paper in 1997. Although the company closed the paper at the end of 2015, that was not the end of our story.

Nor mine. Mid Mon Valley Publishing was formed in 2015 by Keith Bassi, Naz Victoria and Moe Galis, and retired Monessen District Judge Joseph Dalfonso. Several former employees of The Valley Independent were hired by Mid Mon Valley Publishing and remain with the company today.

And, here we are a decade later.

I transitioned from reporter/ city editor at the MVI to managing editor in May 2018, which was a huge change for me.

The “how” of my job has changed, but the “why” hasn’t.

Our physical location, staff, how we produce and distribute the newspaper and the world around us also have changed greatly, but our mission of covering the Mon Valley has not. If you look back through the archives you’ll find local news and sports, election results, obituaries, columns, photographs, classified ads and local events — all of which you can still find six days a week in print and online.

In an era when anyone can post anything online, being a trusted source as your local newspaper is what we strive for everyday.

Accuracy, ethics and accountability still guide our work. That combination of modern delivery and traditional integrity is why people continue to turn to their local paper.

Over the past decade, we have weathered numerous challenges, including the rise of digital media, economic downturns, the COVID-19 pandemic, and changes in reader habits, but we have remained a fixture in the community.

Newspapers provide the facts that keep civic life running: municipal budgets, school board debates and local elections that rarely make national headlines but matter most to our daily lives. We also highlight the stories that make a community feel connected: high school sports, neighborhood events, new businesses and profiles of people who make a difference.

We have evolved to meet our readers where they are — via our website, mobile apps and social media pages.

We are proud to be your local community newspaper, and plan to celebrate our 10th anniversary with a banquet on May 2. It truly takes a community to keep a community newspaper going and we are immensely grateful for ours.

Thank you for taking this journey with us, for making it possible, whether today is your first day as a digital subscriber or you’ve had a newspaper delivered for half a century or more, as many of our longtime neighbors have. We also thank our many advertisers for supporting our newspaper.

It’s every bit as much your celebration as ours.

And to my many mentors who have helped me along the way, including retired editors Ruth Yatkso, Karen Peters, Jeff Oliver, the late great, Joe “Bumawitz” Abramowitz and Bob Burke, thank you for instilling in me the values of real, authentic journalists. I hope I’ve passed down some of your wisdom to the next generation. And to my current staff, which includes my longtime colleagues that joined me from the former VI, Sports Editor Jeremy Sellew, News Editor Carl Hill and our invaluable news assistant Terri Sichi, whose contributions to the paper over many decades are priceless, I couldn’t do it without all of you by my side.

As for me, I still can’t think of anything I’d rather do than write, edit and produce a community newspaper. Telling the stories of the people and places in the Mon Valley for the last three decades has been a joy of my life. And I’m indebted to you, dear reader, for joining me on that journey. But, we have many, many more stories to tell here at the Mon Valley Independent. Hopefully, you’ll join us on our journey for many more years to come.

Stacy Wolford can be contacted at swolford@yourmvi.com.