2007 was a banner year for bringing more local media to many more west Bronx residents.

In late 2006, the Norwood News introduced the West Bronx News Network, a collaboration that includes the Highbridge Horizon, another nonprofit paper published by the Highbridge Community Life Center, and the Mount Hope Monitor, an on-line effort launched by the Norwood News with support from the Mount Hope Housing Company. In 2007, the Network introduced the print edition of the Monitor and published five issues in 2007. The Monitor will be published monthly throughout 2008. The Network also launched the West Bronx Blog (www.westbronxnews.blogspot.com), the first news and policy blog of its kind in the borough. Reporters and editors from all three publications contribute to it.

The Norwood News also launched a new Web site (www.norwoodnews.org) with many new features, including fully searchable archives, the ability to e-mail and print articles, RSS feeds, and PDFs of the print edition. All of the paper’s contents are now available on line for free.

In early 2008, Norwood News and Mount Hope Monitor will start the West Bronx Youth Journalism Initiative, which is made possible by a generous grant from the New York Foundation. The program will teach the fundamentals of writing and reporting to a dozen local high school students, and their work will be published in Network publications.