E-mail List Gives Inside View of Richmond

Do you ever wish you could visit a web site, or belong to an e-mail list, tailored specifically to your neighborhood, where folks would answer your questions about the tastiest Q, best taco truck, most helpful mortgage broker, cheapest and best home repair? Where you could find out whether those popping noises you just heard were gunshots or a car backfiring, and ask if anyone wants to adopt the kittens your cat just had, and hear about the next block party? Some folks are lucky enough to have a site like that, and among them are the participants in Richmond’s North and East News list.

You can’t join unless you live in Richmond’s North and East neighborhood, north of MacDonald to the Richmond/San Pablo border and east of 23rd to San Pablo Avenue. But this list, founded in 2004 by longtime Richmond real estate agent Michael J., with 222 members and 372 posts in December 2007 alone, is a network with panache—and clout.

It’s monitored by such notables as Richmond City Councilmember Tom Butt and Police Chief Chris Magnus (pictured above – Magnus lives in the ‘hood), and both have been known to take action to solve complaints or concerns voiced by residents. Residents can access the discussions either via the Web site or by signing up for the e-mail list. If you don’t have a list like this for your community, you might want to (to paraphrase the Bay Area’s “Scoop” Nisker) make one of your own.