Publisher’s Christmastime Message: Many thanks for these extraordinary years

Published 8:27 am Friday, December 26, 2025

By KARI BORGEN Regional publisher (retired)

I inherited the tradition of writing an annual Christmas publisher’s message from former Daily Astorian publisher Steve Forrester. Freshly moved to the North Coast in December of 2017, I penned my first column as publisher that same month. In it I opined “I hope you will see what I see — a unique and extraordinary community, landscape and newspaper. Look as I do and you will appreciate how lucky we are.”

Eight years later, as I look to my retirement at the end of this month, I still think that I have been lucky to live in Astoria, be a part of this community and this newspaper.

There’s been a lot of water under the bridge, literally and figuratively, since that first column. A lot of colleagues coming and going amidst career changes and company changes. Elected and appointed officials at all levels winning and losing positions. Businesses opening, closing during COVID, sometimes reopening, sometimes not.

If we can count on anything in our lives, we can count on the fact that things will change. Whether we embrace it as an opportunity or mourn it as loss is up to us.

As we look forward to 2026, even the tradition of making New Year resolutions reflects a conscious effort to change. We resolve to do better than we did this year by leaving old habits behind and improving ourselves through change.

Astoria and the North Coast will continue to be challenged to meld heritage traditions with new ideas into cohesive and forward-thinking communities. We may not always agree on the methods, but when it comes to the places that we love, residents recognize and embrace opportunities to change for the better. To be better.

I’m looking forward to changes at The Astorian — new publisher John Bruijn has long standing in this industry and community, but he and his team have fresh eyes and perspective on improvements to be made in The Astorian.

I’m now on to my own life changes. Sincere thanks to current and former colleagues, readers, friends and neighbors who have played such a large role in my time in this extraordinary community and newspaper.