Pounds: A very good year
Written by Tom Pounds | President / Publisher | tpounds@toledofreepress.comThere are a great many ways to measure a year: personal relationships, professional success, community impact. By any of those standards, we have a lot to be thankful for as we look back on 2012.
2012 saw Toledo Free Press receive its fourth consecutive honor as best weekly newspaper in Ohio from the Ohio Society of Professional Journalists. But the thing we are perhaps most proud of is the increasing number of philanthropic projects we have been able to sponsor.
Some of these events are original and just beginning what should be very long legacies. To name just a few, there is the “Holiday Wishes” series of local music CDs benefiting Make-A-Wish. There is the explosive growth of Restaurant Week Toledo, our partnership with Leadership Toledo. We are humbled to be the media partner for the summer Round Up Hunger campaign for Feed Lucas County Children and the American Red Cross Ready U series. We enjoyed a tremendous night for the Red Cross with our Titanic re-creation dinner and dance on the 100th anniversary of the ship’s April 14 sinking.
We were also pleased to assist the first Ghoulwill Ball for Goodwill Industries, Ken Leslie’s 1Matters and Tent City and the latest Cattle Baron’s Ball for the American Cancer Society.
We have been pleased to work with Toledo’s LGBT community for the Toledo Pride Festival and parade, and to have served three years as media sponsor for the Holiday with Heart Charity Gayla. We also sponsored the Jennifer Rockwood-directed play “8” at the University of Toledo, which centered around marriage equality.
On the business scene, we saw another successful year as a media sponsor for the Better Business Bureau Torch Awards and the Entrepreneurial & Business Excellence Hall of Fame.
On the arts side, we helped with such projects as Grugelfest, the PechaKucha series, 2445 events at the Toledo Museum of Art, the Sur-Saint Clair exhibit of the works of Robert Heindel and the upcoming New Year’s Eve concert by the Johnny Knorr Orchestra. We also had one of the best nights of the year at the Schedel Gardens gala.
There were many others, each of which we were proud to be associated with, including Multiple Sclerosis Society (Leadership Class), Junior Achievement, the Owens Community College Foundation (Backpack to the Future and the Alumni Golf Outing) and the ProMedica Advocacy Fund.
At this year’s Holiday with Heart event, Toledo Free Press Editor in Chief Michael S. Miller commented that our partnership with the Gayla was not about Toledo Free Press accepting the gay community; it was about the gay community accepting Toledo Free Press. That sentiment carries through each and every one of our partnerships. Our philanthropic efforts are never about our choosing a cause; they are about the honor of these causes choosing us.
Toledo Free Press looks forward to another full slate of events and philanthropy in 2013.
Thomas F. Pounds is president and publisher of Toledo Free Press and Toledo Free Press Star. Contact him at tpounds@toledofreepress.com.
Tags: 1Matters, Ghoulwill Ball, Goodwill Industries, Grugelfest, Holiday Wishes 2, Holiday with Heart Charity Gayla, Jennifer Rockwood, Junior Achievement, Ken Leslie, Leadership Toledo, Make-A-Wish, Multiple Sclerosis Society, Ohio Society of Professional Journalists, Owens Community College Foundation, PechaKucha, ProMedica Advocacy Fund, Publisher's Statement, Restaurant Week Toledo, Tent City, Toledo Free Press, Tom Pounds
