Got word that one of my posts was getting some attention at Reuters so I had to look. I have been given some attention on other online newspapers in Chicago but it looks like I have moved up the food chain a bit. Back in Sept I wrote about Crime in Concord and that was picked up as well as the post for the new home of the Walnut Creek Police Dept. How they choose their stories is a mystery to me but I am going to find out. Either way I appreciate all of the new visitors that have stopped by due to these posts in Reuters.

I made it to the MDUSD District office before they closed. I had a great conversation with Lori Amenta the Assistant to the District General Council. Lori is working hard to bring donations in for these kids and explained she is happy to work longer hours and through lunch breaks to get things done for HOPE. I dropped off my donation which they were thankful for and I got to hear some more stories about kids in Concord and surounding cities that are less fortunate than us. Trust me, if you are reading this blog then there is a good chance you have more than most of these kids. The story in the Contra Costa Times really pulled my heart strings. Maybe that's melodramatic but the article did touch me enough to do something about it. I wasn't always the Mayor of Concord, I remember growing up with financial problems and I have made every effort to make sure my family and I don't have to worry about food on the table or a roof over our heads. As I mentioned in the previous post about homeless students, kids should not be going without food and from the stories I heard ...

Just as an update on the Concord Police request I put in, I won't write too much on this. I got a call today from the CPD and spoke with Lieutenant Gartner. I kept calling him 'sir' or Lieutenant and I had flashbacks like I was talking to my old XO. As promised, he got back to me regarding the question of being added to the Concord Police Press Releases. He explained that bloggers do have to meet some standards to get added to press releases. The mainstream media gets added since their is an implied professionalism not always found with bloggers. That and the amount of requests that a police department could get for these requests could be inundating. I have been added to the Concord Major Crimes Press Release distrubution list. WooHoo for me. As these come through, I will post them. Thank you Lieutenant Gartner.

Thanks to Brittney over at Eye on Blogs for sharing this with her readers. I get a fair amount of emails regarding my site but Gmail was flooded today. I think that Brittney poses a great question on her site and I want to respond to some of the comments I have received about the original post. Should governmental agencies release memos and other information given freely to mainstream media organizations to any blogger who asks? Should there be vetting of bloggers? Wouldn't an agency become overrun if they granted every request, or are there really that many minibloggers interested to make a dent? The point of a press release is to announce information to the public. It doesn't take much to have a short list of mainstream news to proactively contact with the hopes that they may run a story. The question is what about the rest of us that want to know what the mainstream isn't covering. There have been many cases where I see a press release on another site that has got zero exposure on mainstream news. The city is capable of publishing this information online. If bloggers can't be added to the distribution list for information the ...

It's that time again where I pull from my reader emails and post one that I want to share. Actually, I have about 10 of these posts ready to go now. Since I made the original "Email the Mayor" post back in October, there have been many emails that have come through and I've been building them up so I can have a few in the pipe. This email comes from John in Concord. I have a lot of friends that post crazy stuff on their myspace and on YouTube. I try to explain to them that this type of stuff can come back to haunt them but they don't care. They say that if they don't show anything illegal that they don't have to worry. Can you write up a post about the dangers of posting things online? -John Thanks John. The truth is that in the digital age people are making videos and posting pictures of themselves like no other time in history. I for example pretty much post my entire life through pictures videos and my blogs. I have a fairly trasparent life but I do keep certain things personal and  off the grid. Kids are probably the most naive about putting ...

I made a call to the Concord Police Dept and spoke with Lieutenant Gartner in the cities Major Crimes Division. I wanted to know how and if I could be added to their distribution list for press releases. The Concord Police issue press releases individually through each division so starting with Major Crimes made the most sense. I figure this is the information most people would be interested in reading about in the city. The Concord Police issue these to mainstream media like the Contra Costa Times and local TV with the hopes of getting some attention put on a criminal event. The problem with mainstream media is that they have agendas and they usually roll around sensationalism, so if there is a HOT topic being discussed, these city press releases can get lost in the shuffle or only given minimal exposure to the public. This is where local blogs come into play. A local blog has a specific focus and generally speaking does not carry an agenda. Concord is a relatively small city for a blog to focus on. I would have thought a year ago that a blog focusing on suburbia would be of little interest to anyone, but I ...

The next President of the United States of America has been declared. Did you vote for him? Over 65% of Contra Costa County voted for Barack Obama.

Great day for an election. I went to my local polling place and put in my ballots, voting for what I felt strongly about. You don't care who I voted for as President. I will say that I didn't write myself in this time.

The purpose of every blog is to get readers. Maybe it's a select group of readers like your friends and family or maybe you want your readership to get mass coverage. When I started the Mayor of Concord dot Com I really wanted to get the attention of the local community but was also open to seeing if anyone outside the Bay Area would want to read the articles. Getting noticed by other media is not an easy task. Some will find your site through word of mouth, others through basic research. One of the quickest paths to getting tapped into a mass audience is to use available tools to spread the word about your blog to as many other sites like yours like a type of blog marketing.It is a long process and there are no guarantees that anyone else wants to read your site but if it pays off, it could allow you to touch a much larger base of readers than you initially intended. That was the case with this. Chicago Sun Times hosts Mayor of Concord News Not exactly the Contra Costa Times or other Bay Area newspaper but it's a start. The Chicago Sun Times - Courier ...

Looks like the mystery man over at Claycord dot com is making some changes to the site. It's got to be difficult using the blogger platform without being able to rewrite a new css template from scratch. Blogger doesn't allow for a whole lot of customization on the look an feel but it is functional and easy to use. That's why people tend to get started on them as a blogging platform first. Initially it started with a three column effect adding the recent comments section to the left side. Claycord had asked the readers what they thought of the minor change and it appeared that most the comments were possitive. It definitely makes finding the hot topic easier. But since yesterday when that change took place Mr. Mayor Claycord was busy moving things around like pushing up the RSS link and even putting up a new header in the site. The old header looked good to me but now it's a bit more bold and in your face than before and that's a good thing. He hasn't posted anything on the new lookso there may be more changes coming but as it stands at this morning, the new layout looks better ...

I've been receiving emails since this site was created. Some in the begining were not so nice but those have become less frequent over the past couple months. I have getting emails from readers that range from general information like how do I set up my own blog to more specific questions like where do I go in Concord to get the best Sushi. I have been replying to these emails one by one as I get them. I'm plugged into a computer about 20 hrs a day so getting and sending emails back is a fairly quick process. Over the last couple of weeks I have been getting more and one recent letter gave me the suggestion: You must get some emails from other readers than me. Since you seem to want to keep the conversation going, why don't you post some of the interesting letters to the site. You have been able to answer most of my questions and though i don't always agree with you, it's nice to get an honest reply. -A reader This is a great idea. Thank you "Mr. Reader". I'll keep names anonymous if asked and Mr. Reader asked. So I am going to start a ...

A few weeks back I wrote about how a new cause was created on Facebook for the election of Gary Eberhart and Sherry Whitmarsh for the MDUSD School Board. Speaking of that there is a great debate online that you can watch to understand more about the candidates running. I've been on Facebook for a while, there are few social media sites I am not on. (Is that Narcissistic?) Whatever. Either way, it was exciting to see that good people like Gary Eberhart had a profile already and was using his network to help in the campaign. After the Facebook cause was setup and got some attention, it looks like other people from Claycord/Concord made the move and joined Facebook to expand their networks. I have added a few people to my network and I'm always happy to have more people to chat with but don't make a habit of asking to be added to peoples networks that I don't know in some way or have a good feeling they will accept. Here are some people on Facebook that live in the Concord area that everyone should be friends with. Gary Eberhart Andre Gensburger Mayor O' Claycord Cowell Ca There are many people in ...

A couple quick changes to the site have been made. Bookmark tools: I added a way for you to quickly save and upload bookmarks online. As you can see from the "Favorite Internet Links" section in the sidebar, besides adding YouTube clips I want to share and quick updates on Twitter, I use a couple different bookmarking tool. Using bookmarking tools like Delicious or Digg you can save websites you like easily and then share them with your friends. I've added a small bar of different bookmarking tools on the end of each post. Related Posts from Concord Over time websites that grow a lot in content seem to have great posts that are lost over time. When you read a story and want to know what else related to the last post is available on the website, where do you look? I've added a section of related news posts from Concord at the bottom before the reader comments section. This is also visible on the RSS feed. Picture comments This is my favorite.  I had gotten a couple emails asking about how to add a picture for a reader comment. With Blogger, this is done pretty easily by setting up your Blogger profile. WordPress, ...