Elections, human interest ideas take floor at Appen staff forum

About two dozen people attended Appen Press Club’s second stop on its 2024 “Listening Tour” Feb. 15 at From the Earth Brewery Company.

Members of Appen Media’s newsroom made themselves available to the public to listen to feedback from readers and talk about what they would like to see more of in their local newspaper.

The Alpharetta-Roswell Herald has been serving the Alpharetta and Roswell communities since 1983 and is currently delivered to 28,000 homes weekly. It also serves as the legal organ for the City of Roswell, which means that it publishes all of the city’s legal notices about public meeting dates, tax dollar allocation and rezoning of property.

Newsroom staff also fielded questions about whether they disclose sources, how news is localized, best practices on facilitating city council debates and other election coverage.

Some attendees also encouraged staff to cover more human interest stories. As always, the group’s inbox at newsroom@appenmedia.com is open to any and all ideas — reporters would love to cover community pillars, eccentrics, feel-good efforts, and anything in between.

“We appreciate the people of Roswell welcoming us and providing us with some great story ideas and ways we can better serve them,” Appen Media Publisher Hans Appen said. “They are an engaged citizenry, and it is important to us to give them information and tools to more effectively realize the vision they have for their future.”

Appen also announced that the company is in the process of digitizing all its archived newspapers for online consumption.