Happy (Let Us Pray) New Year: New Look, New Name and a New Decade for Newsmakers

Newsmakers with JR
Dec 31, 2024
2 min read

A quick New Year's note to our community of treasured subscribers and viewers:

Over the next few days, Newsmakers will be moving our operations to the Substack platform from Wix, where we've lived on the web for the past seven years.

As a practical matter, the change will not be disruptive to you: although future posts will look slightly differently visually, you should still receive our newsletters, free and without interruption. However, please add our new email -- sbnewsmakers@gmail.com - to your contacts just to make sure our posts don't end up in your spam or junk folders.

As always, the newsletter will be sent to you at no cost; that said, we would greatly appreciate if you can help us grow our subscriber list by letting a friend of family know about Newsmakers.

For us, Substack provides a more robust and cheaper base and operations, and it also gives us more flexibility to add other voices to Newsmakers as time goes on.

We began providing analysis, commentary and enterprise journalism about Santa Barbara public affairs back in 2014, with the launch of our old "City Desk" show on TVSB. In 2017, we reinvented ourselves as "Newsmakers with Jerry Roberts," and subsequently produced more than 1000 posts and nearly 500 video shows on our website and YouTube channel.

Now, we're again changing things up a bit.

As of next week, when we'll be back with a new post, our masthead will be "SB Newsmakers."

The reason: "Santa Barbara Newsmakers" provides us a broader platform that reflects our plan to recruit an expanded roster of writers to fulfill our mission of providing smart and enterprising journalism about the most important challenges facing our community,

We'll have more to share about that and other new developments in weeks to come.

For now, all best wishes for your celebration of what promises to be a year of challenges and surprises.

As for Newsmakers, our New Year's resolution is to stop procrastinating, and we plan to get to it next week.

Cartoon by Kaamran Hafeez for The New Yorker.

22 Comments

gruhalakshmiyojana93

4 days ago

Thanks to Gruha Lakshmi Yojana and Janani Suraksha Yojana that support women during important life stages. Homemakers receive deserved recognition through financial assistance, while expectant mothers benefit from safe delivery incentives. These programs reduce financial worry and encourage healthier decisions. Communities become stronger when women feel secure and respected. Such initiatives truly reflect dedication toward compassionate governance.

maiyasammanyojana12

4 days ago

Heartfelt thanks for Maiya Samman Yojana and Atal Pension Yojana. Maiya Samman Yojana empowers women by providing regular financial support and dignity. Atal Pension Yojana, with its clear pension chart, helps workers understand contributions and secure a guaranteed pension after retirement. These schemes reduce financial stress, promote savings, and ensure social security. Such initiatives truly strengthen families and build confidence among common citizens.

Aryan

Oct 22, 2025

The digitalization of land records through the Bihar Bhumi Jankari portal is a commendable step towards transparency and reducing disputes over property ownership.

Aryan

Oct 21, 2025

The convenience of applying for essential documents like Caste and Income Certificates through RTPS Bihar online has significantly reduced the need for citizens to visit government offices repeatedly.

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