On April 6, a 38-year-old Boca Raton man was killed in a collision with a truck along A1A in Delray Beach south of Linton Boulevard. I wish I could tell you more about this unfortunate accident, but Florida statutes don’t allow The Coastal Star to obtain the accident report for 60 days. Delray Beach enforces a law prohibiting access to accident reports for the purpose of contacting the drivers and occupants for commercial solicitation. Makes sense.
There are exceptions for newspapers — but they must meet certain criteria according to the statute and one of these is frequency. Although we are often the only newspaper to cover our local municipalities, our monthly publishing cycle keeps us from gaining access to accident reports before the end of the 60-day moratorium blocking release to the public.
So, when is a newspaper not a newspaper? When the law says we aren’t, it seems. So, until the statutes get up to speed with the changing mediascape, we may not always be able to give full reports about accidents along our main street.
With summer comes a reduction in the number of cultural events in our area. As a result, Palm Beach ArtsPaper takes a break — in print. Instead, ArtsPaper editor Greg Stepanich will write a monthly column featuring the “not-to-miss” events of the summer (this month on page 27) and, of course, continues to update www.palmbeachartspaper.com. In October, the print version will return with a special season preview.
I love that so many of you want to receive The Coastal Star at your northern homes. We make this possible for an $18 (annual or seasonal) subscription. If you haven’t signed up yet, you’ll find a form on page 10. Feel free to mail this in, or drop it by our office before you head north.
We mail these issues via bulk mail, so are at the mercy of the US Postal service. Please be aware that although we publish on the first weekend of each month, you may not receive your copy for a week or more. Of course you can always stay in touch via our Website at www.thecoastalstar.com.
Now back to spring-cleaning. Thanks for sharing my dust!
— Mary Kate Leming, Editor
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