New African-American community newspaper in Cape

A new publication hit the streets of Cape Girardeau this month. Now, I normally would avoid telling people about a potential advertising competitor to this fine newspaper, but the "The Crossroad" is only publishing once a month, which means the small staff have to stretch to beat the Southeast Missourian on news coverage and time-sensitive advertising.

Published by Lloyd Williams through his Afrocentric Arts and Publishing LLC, "The Crossroad" seeks to be a voice for the African-American community of Cape Girardeau and Southeast Missouri. The first issue, eight pages in all, featured articles on the parks tax initiative, Sen. Barack Obama's Philadelphia speech on racism and a mission statement.

Williams also included poetry and published the schedule of the Cape Girardeau County Transit Authority as a public service. "Our mission is to inform and give voice to the African-American community of Southeast Missouri and provide meaningful useful content to our readers," according to the unsigned mission statement article.

"We have chosen Crossroad as our publication's name because there are crossroads everywhere," the article states. "There are personal crossroads, political crossroads — geographical crossroads. There are also crossroads of change, time, faith, race and community. And at those crossroads are stories."

Williams knows a bit about crossroads in life. A Cape Girardeau native and graduate of Notre Dame High School, he's lived in Wisconsin where he went to college, received a degree in art and worked for museums. He returned to Cape Girardeau to work, moved to Jefferson City for a position with the Missouri Department of Conservation, joined the U.S. Army Reserve and went through its medical program before returning to Cape Girardeau, where he works as a surgical assistant at Cape Neurosurgical Associates.

"You won't see the word journalist" on the resume, Williams acknowledged.

The idea for The Crossroad came to him at the barber shop, he said. "A guy came in with a flyer about some event in town. I got to wondering, how do blacks in Cape Girardeau communicate? How does word get spread other than by word of mouth? What we need is a publication. That idea just stuck in my head for a while."

After letting the project percolate, Williams took his idea to the Southeast Missouri State University Small Business Development Center, received some advice and put together a mock-up of what the publication would look like.

"The feedback was fairly positive, and it led me to put out this first issue," Williams said.

He's finding that those who labor to obtain the content, such as what I am sharing right now, don't necessarily have cushy jobs. The biggest problem, he said, is obtaining the information necessary to write an article and putting it into a form that is readable and conveys the details.

The important point he's trying to convey with "The Crossroad" is that it will be locally produced with important local information. He also wants to encourage people to help him establish the new publication as a true community voice. "I need their input and feedback," he said. "This is not a one-man show. I want it to reflect and mirror the community."

He's publishing 3,000 copies monthly at first, with distribution in barber shops, beauty shops, churches and retail stores where it will find its targeted audience.

"I want to deal with things that impact this community," he said.

* Small business champion: The National Federation of Independent Business has named Kathy Swan, president of JCS/Tel-Link, as its 2008 Small Business Champion for Missouri.

Swan, who is also chairwoman of the Missouri Coordinating Board for Higher Education and an activist in Republican politics, is, according to the NFIB news release, "a tireless spokesperson for small business, whether she's promoting small business in Jefferson City or participating in a discussion on small business issues with President Bush in Washington, D.C."

The release also cited her political contributions to the NFIB PAC, nominations of local high school seniors for NFIB scholarships and active recruitment of new NFIB members.

Small business owners, Swan said in an interview, need to be aware of and involved in the activities of the Missouri Legislature. Lawmakers listen when small business owners in their district have something to say, she said. Small businesses can give practical help "supporting legislation, can give practical help "supporting legislation, pointing out challenges and pointing out the positives and negatives," she said.

"Everything from taxes to employee benefits can effect a small business," Swan said. "What happens on a state level really does affect us in our local communities."

Swan said she is active in the NFIB as part of her personal commitment to be involved in the community.

* Expanding facilities: Susan Strode, owner of Dockside Furniture & Antiques, 4 N. Spanish St., is expanding her banquet facilities in the adjacent business she calls Upper Deck, son Steve Strode told me.

The city issued a building permit to remodel 4,764 square feet, at an estimated cost of $40,000, on the first floor of the building. The result will be a banquet room capable of accomodating 200 people, Strode said.

Upper Deck, on the second floor, already has five rooms capable of handling parties ranging from 18 to 77 people, he said. But Susan Strode has had to turn down larger events, Steve Strode told me, and she has decided to move ahead with the remodeling project to be competitive with hotels and other facilities.

Steve Strode, a contractor based in St. Louis, is doing the work. "The original plan was to put a banquet center upstairs, but we are putting it on the main level so it is handicapped accessible," he said. The upstairs area that was planned as a banquet facility will instead be a 4,000-square-foot loft apartment, he said.

In addition, the entire outside of the building will receive a face-lift, Strode said.

Susan Strode has been in business with the furniture and antiqe store for about five years, Steve Strode said. The Upper Deck has been in business for about 2 1/2 years, he said.

* Weight loss business: Usually a business isn't interested in recording big losses, but Cheryl Ball of Jackson thinks that would be a sign of success.

Ball is opening Take Shape for Life, a home-based business that will combine health coaching with sales of MetaFast, a meal replacement program that has customers consuming five meals a day from the menu provided by the company and one self-cooked meal. "It is goof-proof for weight loss," Ball said. "It is balanced weight loss that puts you in a mild state of ketosis that forces the body to burn fat."

Ball said she's lost 60 pounds in less than five months. Ball is also a real estate broker with Coldwell Banker Abernathy Realty in Jackson.

From the news release file:

* Carolyn Kempf of Elite Travel Inc. sent out a notice this week that airline travelers need to be ready to pay more in order to take more than one checked bag on a flight. Five of the six major U.S. airlines plan to start charging as much as $25 for the second bag beginning in May, she reports. Continental, Delta, Northwest, United and US Airways are charging $25 and discount carrier AirTran will charge $10. And some carriers have increased the charge for a third bag to as much as $100, she warns. "Several years ago I advised the trend would be for airlines to begin to nickle and dime people for standard perks like paying for pre-assigned seats, food, curbside check-in or premier bulkhead seat and exit row seats ... and now bags."

* Contrend Inc., the authorized Ceco Building Sytems builder in Cape Girardeau, received the Agriculture Building Merit Award at the Ceco 2008 national sales meeting in Tucson. Ceco is a manufacturer of metal building systems that can be customized to meet the needs of the buyer. Contrend Inc. is at 840 S. Kingshighway. The president is Charles J. Morrill of Jackson.

* Best Clean Fireplace Shop will relocate from 1910 Indendence Street to a 2,500-square-foot space in the Eagle Peak Building, 760 S. Kingshighway, said Tom Kelsey, real estate broker with Lorimont Place Ltd. Best Clean, owned by Charles Robinson, sells fireplaces, wood stoves, gas logs and other like items and provides services such as carpet and fireplace cleaning.

Rudi Keller is the business editor of the Southeast Missourian. Contact him at rkeller@semissourian.com or call 335-6611, extension 126.