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A call by some for the Select Board to have more oversight of the publication led to the town vote.

In Brentwood, newsletter opinion on racism in U.S. is dividing residents Resident Alina Arida speaks during a community meeting last month. Todd Bookman / NHPR The Brentwood Newsletter was founded in 1977 to fix a problem: people in town weren’t getting along. “Town meetings were kind of well known for being a bit of shouting affairs,” remembers Linda Rousseau. After securing grant money from the New Hampshire Humanities council, Rousseau and some residents launched the newsletter with the aim of better informing the community about happenings in town, and, hopefully, bring residents t...

Listen to the broadcast version of this story. “It was done on a bad typewriter, where the letters were half missing,” says Rousseau. “It was a mess.”  But by issue number three, Rousseau took over as typist, and for the next four decades, she served as editor of the monthly publication, before retiring a few years ago. Under Rousseau’s tenure, the newsletter was well-regarded, and a must-read for many residents. In the 1980s, residents voted to fund the Brentwood Newsletter with town money, though it remains technically an independent publication. Last year, it received $10,200 in...

BRENTWOOD — The Brentwood Newsletter remained shuttered this week as townspeople continued to grapple with allegations of racism and the New Hampshire ACLU requested records of all town correspondence regarding the free community publication. The website for the monthly publication run by volunteers is locked and password-protected, and no April edition has appeared in the town's mailboxes or email inboxes.  The publication has been under fire after it ran a piece in the March edition written by community member Richard Gagnon titled "Racism: From a White Man's Perspective." The article...

Selectmen announced the meeting will take place at 6 p.m. at the Recreation Center on Route 125. The meeting comes after many residents requested the town no longer support the monthly publication, which has been run by volunteers for the last 40 years, with town tax dollars. If the board decides to continue providing funding, they argued for town oversight on what goes into the publication.  A number of residents were outraged with an editorial that appeared in last month’s newsletter titled "Racism From a White Man's Perspective” written by Richard Gagnon. They objected to the article ...