Whether you are a regular reader of the Norwood News or you are just checking out this website for the first time, I would like to personally thank you for your support of vital community journalism. Now, starting this week, we would like to reward you for your support by offering you more. More news. More photos. More information. More analysis. More multi-media. All of this for free. I know. Sounds too good to be true, right? Let me explain.

Dear Norwood, I can’t remember when I didn’t love you. When I was little, Mom and Dad and a half-dozen siblings would come to Perry Avenue, to Nana and PopPop’s house. It was so exciting after East Greenbush. We’d come down on the Thruway and get off at 233rd Street, and go down Jerome Avenue. I was convinced that the end of the No. 4 train at the Woodlawn station was the gateway to New York. You could see the world from Nana’s house — the subway, the Thanksgiving parade, or just feeding the ducks at Woodlawn Cemetery.

I was at a conference at Fordham University this past May entitled “Moral Outrage and Moral Repair — Reflections on 9/11 and its Afterlife.” The title interested me, as it seemed to accurately describe large portions of my existence this past decade. My brother, Bill Kelly, Jr., died in Tower 1 on September 11th. He wasn’t supposed to be there. He didn’t work at the Trade Center.

In 1998, four years after I became editor of the Norwood News, I was staying at a bed-and-breakfast in Kingston, NY. After introducing myself to another guest at breakfast, l told him where I worked. He laughed and told me he previously worked at the School Construction Authority (SCA), which was then independent of the Board of Education. “We used to fear getting that paper in the mail every time it came out!” he said.

The NYPD has been proud to trumpet plummeting crime stats over the last 15 years or so. Citywide and precinct-wide crime stats are easy to come by. But when it comes to information about crime in your neighborhood or on your block, well, not so much.