One week down, many more to go.

In case you missed it, this here site came into the world at 6 a.m. on Dec. 29, 2010. After weeks of preparation by myself and the rest of the staff here, St. Peters Patch came to life. In the first week—OK, fine, first four days, we've already had a wide variety of stories here. We've dipped into the sports world, talked about food and health and tackled some government issues. It's been a fun first week, but we're not slowing down and we're not stopping.

What you're reading right now is The Editor's Desk, my weekly column to talk to you, dear reader, about the site. I'm Joe Barker, the man behind the curtain of this operation, and this column will give you a look at what goes on behind the scenes.  It could be to explain an editorial decision, talk about how a story developed or to beg for story ideas. 

Since we've already tackled just exactly what this site is all about—St. Peters news and nothing else—I'm not going to waste words explaining St. Peters Patch. Instead, in the spirit of New Years, I'm going to offer 5 resolutions for St. Peters Patch.

1) We resolve to provide fresh content. This isn't a weekly site. This isn't a daily site. This is a site devoted to give you, the reader, stories to read throughout the day. Starting at 6 a.m. every day, you're guaranteed to have fresh content throughout the day. Come back early and often for local news.

2) We resolve to tell the story of the people of St. Peters. Beginning this week, we're going to start profiling people in the community. When I say people in the community, I don't just mean Mayor Len Pagano and other well-known people. Of course we want to profile those people, but we also want to get the lesser-known people in St. Peters. A city is big and emerging as St. Peters has to be full of unsung heroes, and we want to find some.

3) We resolve to be around. We want to tell the story of St. Peters, and that means being in the community. We want to know what's going on and we want to be there. E-mail me at joe.barker@patch.com if you're hosting something that you think deserves coverage and we'll do our best to be there.

4) We resolve to grow this site into the best source for St. Peters news. Right now we're only four days old, but in 2011 we are going to keep growing—more stories, more columns and more news. Next year at the this time we hope that when people think of a place to get St. Peters news, they think of St. Peters Patch.

5) We resolve to provide top-notch sports coverage. The St. Peters sports scene has five high schools and countless other events at the Rec-Plex. This is something that is important to the community and to us. We may not be at every game, but we will be a presence at local sporting events.  

Unlike most resolutions, we plan to keep all of those.

Keep coming back and remember, if you have any questions or comments feel free to send me an email (joe.barker@patch.com) or call me at 636-575-9390.