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We were there.
City Council and school board meetings into the wee hours of the morning. Contentious local elections. New residential, commercial and corporate development projects across Pleasanton — public parks and open space too. Downtown’s continuing evolution into the 21st century while maintaining its historic character. Leadership changes at city hall (and more at the PUSD headquarters).
The highs of Amador Valley and Foothill athletic alumni competing for collegiate, professional or Olympic championships. Current and former residents making their marks on film, on television, on Broadway, on the page and on the canvas. Profiling local leaders of industry, leaders of politics, leaders of charity and leaders of community.
The lows of homicides and deadly car crashes, layoffs and economic downturns, abuse in the shadows, political in-fighting, neighborhood disputes, fires on the ridge or in the heart of town, and a global health pandemic.
And so much important, impactful, entertaining and engaging local storytelling that fell in between.
“The Pleasanton Weekly has provided the perfect communication tool for the community,” said Deborah McKeehan, retired city manager and former president and publisher of the Weekly.
“Because of the unbiased reporting and editorial content, the Weekly has been the trusted source of information regarding difficult and controversial topics,” added McKeehan, who now serves on our Embarcadero Media Foundation Board of Directors. “With its nonprofit status into the future, it continues the freedom to report honestly and objectively the most important events in our community as they occur. Now with the website updates it is also even more valuable timely communication.”
Many longstanding residents remember our first edition on Jan. 28, 2000 — with “Read All About It: Community Newspaper Comes to Pleasanton” etched on the cover. It was a major milestone along the long journey to establish the Pleasanton Weekly.
After careful research, Embarcadero Publishing’s founder Bill Johnson, the original publisher of the Palo Alto Weekly, and the late Bob Thomas, our founding president, identified Pleasanton as the ideal location for the company’s expansion beyond the Peninsula near the end of the last century.
Enter Jeb Bing, the Pleasanton Weekly’s founding publisher and editor who is now editor emeritus in retirement.
“After I was hired in 1999 by the well-established Palo Alto-based weeklies to launch the Pleasanton Weekly, I met with then mayor Ben Tarver to get his thoughts on our new paper. He congratulated me and wished me luck, but added Pleasanton is a small town and there’s no news here. How wrong he was,” Bing reminisced over the weekend.
McKeehan added, “As the City Manager of Pleasanton, I could not have been more excited in 2000, when Bill Johnson visited me to announce the Pleasanton Weekly would publish their first edition a few weeks later.”
With Bing at the helm and soon the late Dolores Fox Ciardelli brought on board as managing editor, the Pleasanton Weekly’s journalistic reputation took off quickly.
“This is our 25th year featuring stories ranging from local ribbon cuttings to national news-breaking events, articles appealing to the many interests of our readers. The school board and the often very controversial city council and planning commission meetings called for a heavy consumption of coffee on my part due to the often late night adjournments,” Bing said.
“Having years of working as a reporter for the Chicago Tribune and as a speechwriter for several corporate leaders, being the editor of the Pleasanton Weekly has been a most rewarding experience in my career,” he added.
Solidifying ourselves as the go-to news source for what’s going on in the Pleasanton community has been the secret to sustaining our local brand of journalism.
“When I joined the Pleasanton Weekly staff, the newspaper and the staff were already part of the fabric of the community,” said Gina Channell Wilcox, the current publisher of the Pleasanton Weekly and president of Embarcadero Media Foundation’s East Bay Division.
“Just about every household in Pleasanton received a newspaper in the mailbox on Fridays and everyone read it from cover to cover, often discussing the stories, Jeb Bing’s ‘Around Pleasanton’ column or the editorial over coffee outside Peet’s or breakfast at Vic’s,” Wilcox added. “Now we have more readers online, but we still deliver journalism that informs, entertains and inspires.”
We’ve been there with you through thick, thin and everything in between – an honor and a privilege that we don’t take for granted. And with your continued support of our local journalism, the Pleasanton Weekly will be here for the next 25 years and beyond.
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