CHELSEA — Chelsea’s new quarterly newsletter has a simple and sweet tagline: “Good news the old fashioned way.”

The Chelsea Spotlight was founded last year by Heidi Chapman who — along with a group of dedicated volunteers — has published two, eight-page editions. A third is due out in April.

Chapman came up with the idea during the COVID-19 pandemic, when she noticed there was more isolation and political polarization taking place in the community.

“I feel like we’re losing the ability to really connect with our neighbors,” Chapman said, adding that the closure of Chelsea High School in 2018 added to that feeling. “This is an answer to some of all that stuff.”

Chapman and other committee members are currently going through the process to become a 501c3 nonprofit organization, which will allow them to apply for grants and other funding sources. A print edition of the newsletter is mailed to each Chelsea household and costs $1,500 to produce.

On Saturday from 4 to 10 p.m., the group will hold a fundraiser at The Wagon Wheel, a Chelsea restaurant located at 1 Maple Ave. The Pillsbury Slowboys and Donna Thunder Medicine Show will perform. There will also be a buffet meal and a 50/50 raffle. Tickets can be purchased in advance for $20 at the VT 110 Quick Stop in Chelsea, by emailing thechelseaspotlight@googlegroups.com or by calling (802) 685-3884. Tickets cost $25 at the door. More information can be found at thechelseaspotlight.com/event.

In addition to a fundraising campaign, the group will also ask the town for $2,000 during this year’s Town Meeting to help them get up and running.

“We don’t necessarily want to be an ongoing burden to taxpayers,” Chapman said. “We’d like to figure out other ways to do this.”

Each edition of The Chelsea Spotlight has a theme. The first edition, published last fall, was about the old school and the new school. It featured residents’ memories of Chelsea High School and an interview with Janet Cash, the new principal at First Branch Unified District. The second edition, published in January, was about the town’s forests and trees. April’s edition will focus on cemeteries and cellar holes throughout town. Lisa Milchman, a member of the committee, said working on the newsletter has allowed her to form connections with other long-time residents she knew of, but not necessarily knew well.

The newsletter was founded before last year’s turmoil on the town’s Selectboard, when four members resigned in November after a conflict with the town’s road crew and four new members being voted in during a special election in early January. But in some ways, what happened reinforced the Spotlight crew’s mission “to connect community members and cultivate a shared sense of pride and investment in the place we call home,” according to its statement of purpose.

“I was excited in part because like many towns we have a somewhat active Facebook page and as is the case with social media … people are not always kind or interacting in a way that’s conducive to feeling good about what’s going on in town,” Milchman said. “There’s lots of good and interesting stuff going on in town, but often what you see on social media is someone has a gripe and other people gripe along.”

Currently, there are 625 copies of the newsletter printed to be distributed to each household in Chelsea, though that number may be increasing so that there are enough copies to distribute to businesses, Chapman said.

While the Spotlight is also available online, it was important for the group that it be printed.

“There are a lot of people who don’t use the internet and people who wouldn’t necessarily subscribe if we did that version,” Chapman said. “This way it just gets thrown in front of everyone in town as a potential for connecting us all.”

The community’s response has largely been positive.

“It’s about building morale and connection around the fact that we’ve all chosen to live here. This is our home,” Chapman said. “There’s a lot of great history here and beauty and people. Hopefully (we’re) reminding people of that, if they need it.”

Liz Sauchelli can be reached at esauchelli@vnews.com or 603-727-3221.

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