Ray Eckenrode

The team at Breeze Newspapers has dealt with hurricanes, large and small, many times over the past five decades, but Ian was my first.

When I took over the role of publisher of Breeze Newspapers in 2019, I knew hurricanes were something I’d have to deal with. To drive that point home, Hurricane Dorian threatened my travel plans as I arrived in Florida on Labor Day Weekend of that year before eventually making landfall in the Bahamas.

As a transplant, I learned the intricacies of the forecast cone and hurricane kit, but for three years — week after week, month after month, season after season — no hurricanes, a few close calls, but nothing more. That is, of course, until Ian first showed his face in the Caribbean and the local TV weather’s usual bubbly presentations got more stone-faced each day. We talked in the same tones here. It just felt different. And it was.

For Breeze Newspapers and likely for each of you, Ian marked a turning point in our lives, now on a course much different than just a few weeks ago.

We suffered serious damages from Ian. Our Fort Myers Beach office is barely standing and suffered catastrophic storm surge damage. Our Cape Coral office, which houses the Breeze operations and Ogden Digital and Directories, suffered heavy wind and water damage and is partially inoperable right now. Our offices on Sanibel and Pine Island are standing, but we’ve been unable to assess them much beyond that. Our printing plant on Jetport Loop in Fort Myers weathered the storm well and is up and running again.

At the Breeze, we’ve been on dual paths since Sept. 28, trying to begin picking up the pieces of our own lives at the same time as getting back to the business of community newspapering. I’ve watched in amazement our teams have gathered news, largely without the aid of Wi-Fi or even cell service in many cases, and assembled makeshift quarters for sales, ad design and accounting. With the support of our corporate offices, we were able to publish e-editions in four of our markets on Oct. 5 and a few days later the special print edition you’re reading now.

As we recover along with the rest of Southwest Florida, you’ll see some changes in our operation.

The big absence in our operation will mirror the big absence in Southwest Florida as we’ll temporarily suspend publication of our many tourism-related products until tourists return — and they will return.

There will be an increased focus on real-time digital news gathering and digital advertising sales via our web sites: capecoralbreeze.com, captivasanibel.com, fortmyersbeachtalk.com, northfortmyersneighbor.com and pineisland-eagle.com.

We’ll continue to publish weekly e-editions for Fort Myers Beach, Sanibel-Captiva and Pine Island and, as the pace of recovery quickens, we’ll return to limited print editions, likely distributed at just a few key locations at first, until we’re back to full capacity.

In Cape Coral, we’ll resume printing Wednesday and Friday Breeze newspapers, beginning next week, Oct. 12 and Oct. 14.

We’ll also continue to publish our monthly Community Lifestyles magazine, which is distributed by direct mail.

In short, we’ll do our very best to do what any good community newspaper should do: reflect its community. In this case, a community that is resilient and determined.

Ray Eckenrode, publisher