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CONSIDER ALTERNATIVE TO RAMSEY RESIDENT NEWSLETTER <br /> Linda Waite Smith, Administrative Services Manager <br /> <br />Background: <br /> <br />Section 12.13 of the Ramsey City Charter states: "A newsletter shall be published by the <br />city at regular intervals at least six times each year. The postal roll for the city shall be <br />used for the distribution." <br /> <br />Currently we comply with this requirement by printing the Ramsey Resident seven times <br />per year. The newsletter is assembled by City staff, printed by Speedy Copy of Anoka, <br />and delivered by the US Postal Service. <br /> <br />The 1996 budget for the newsletter is $25,444. Aborn half of this is for printing and <br />postage. The other half is for staff time. The Administrative Services Manager acquires <br />or writes the articles, edits copy and approves final layout. Clerical staff members type <br />all the articles, do the layout on computer, and paste it up for copying. Additional staff <br />time is required to deliver the newsletter to the printer and pick up the printed copies, sort <br />the 5,700 copies for bulk mailing and deliver them to the post office. <br /> <br />This summer we requested quotes for printing and received four. They ranged from <br />$7,126 (our current price) to $8,365 per year. Postage costs are currently $0.114 cents <br />per copy. <br /> <br />An Alternative: <br /> <br />We have been approached by the publisher of the Andover, Ramsey, Ham Lake Times <br />about the possibility of printing our newsletter information in their monthly newspaper. <br />Mr. Bradley Allan estimates that based on past issues of our newsletter that we would <br />require two full newspaper pages. Part of the reason for the reduction in space is that <br />much of the information in our newsletter is sent to us by the Extension Service and other <br />agencies. That same information is sent to other communities and appears in their <br />newsletters. The information we print in the Andover, Ramsey, Ham Lake Times would <br />be specific to what's happening in our City. Our two pages would not include generic <br />articles from outside sources. <br /> <br />As mentioned above, the newspaper is printed monthly. The cost of printing our <br />information on two full pages would be $500 per month. If we needed more than two <br />pages, we would pay a prorated amount, e.g. $50 for one-fifth of a page. In addition to <br />priming costs, there is a $0.06 per household charge for delivery. Delivery is done by the <br />same company that delivers the Anoka County Union and uses the ECM newspaper <br />boxes. <br /> <br /> <br />