Final Week For Editor of Havre de Grace Patch

As the saying goes, it takes a village to raise a child.

My wife and I—with our hectic schedules and two young children—are firm believers in that notion.

So as Havre de Grace Patch—my third baby, some might say—nears its second birthday, I want to take the time to thank everyone who has made its success possible.

I'm often asked how we have stories so quickly—pulling up to the scene of bank robberies at the same time as police, or showing up to the scene of an emergency only to get out of the way of the ambulance that was also responding. The answer is simple: we have a really strong, engaged readership.

I often hear about an incident from an informed reader before I do from any other source.

So I hope those readers will be just as nice to the next editor of the site.

Many of my primary sources have known for a few weeks that we'd have a new editor at the helm of Havre de Grace Patch. Now I can say we're in full transition mode.

Starting next week, the picture, name and email address atop the site will change (I'll let the new editor introduce themselves to you all at that point in time).

One thing that won't change: the mission of Havre de Grace Patch.

The basics will remain—and some new features I haven't had time to implement lately will begin to appear.

The best thing about Patch's evolution has been the increased ability for the reader to interact and actually remove the middle man—you can post photos, events and content directly to the site.

I'm not leaving Patch—far from it. You'll still see my byline on the site. You'll still see me around town. You can still reach out to me if you need anything.

But the day-to-day oversite of Havre de Grace Patch is being handed over to someone highly qualified, energized and full of ideas.

I won't list all my 'Thank You' messages here—there are far too many and I'm afraid I'll leave people out. 

I need to start out by thanking my family. While I consider many of you an extension of that family, it's my wife and kids that are often left at home when I'm out around the community. Just as many times, its a family member or friends helping out with the kids so I can cover a story or attend a meeting.

Then there are the many sources and contacts I often utilize to tell these stories. The late night and early morning phone calls from "The Patch guy" often take those individuals away from their families. I thank them for believing in the value of Patch.

But, in general, I want to say thank you to the backbone of Havre de Grace: the volunteers, the people who get involved, the people who are in the know and who want to make Havre de Grace a better place. I want to thank our readers, who never hesitated to reach out and offer their input, news tips, desires and criticisms.

It's easy in this line of work to get caught up providing information to a number of target audiences. But our target has never changed.

We're here to make life easier for the Havre de Grace resident.

Thanks for being the village to help nurture my Patch.

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