LAWRENCE COUNTY - (December 15, 2021) - The Lawrence County Zephyr has launched in the local news coverage, community event coverage, business, and much more.
Bill Raines decided to go on his own in providing the news and information that readers have come to miss over the years. Journalism facing growing critics of being biased along political lines.
Raines worked for WBIW as an assignment reporter for WBIW radio and resigned on October 7,2021.
" I have always been interested in news coverage both in print and on television at an early age," said Raines
" When I was younger in elementary school, I use to write a small news story on notebook paper and place it on the bulletin board at the Fayetteville store," said Raines
Raines was part of the school newspaper both at Bedford Junior High School, Bedford North Lawrence High School and Telecommunications programs that included both radio and television at the BNLHS back in the 90s.
" My first hard core interview was with the late Bedford Mayor John Williams in high school doing a segment on the 10th Street (John Williams Blvd) project and Beech Street Extension. I was a high school student and doing the news for Star Station 31 and loved doing real news story back then.
Mayor Williams being generous to the high school students allowed me to interview him on his big project. A camera man and I went down to the city hall and done a in depth news story with Mayor Williams explaining the project. For the footage I went to the bridge at 16th Street at the overpass by the Pizza Hut while vehicles passing by. At the time 16th street, the only west to east access besides State Road 58.
" The camera man and I went on to Wal-Mart that was located on 16th Street to do interviews with Bedford residents. Well, that did not go as plan as we were kindly told to move on by Wal-Mart management. I still laugh about us being throwed out of Wal-Mart," said Raines
"I also, performed on what was termed B-Roll footage for ESPN when Carrie Mount won an award for high school sports during that time period,"
Raines worked for Wal-Mart for Eight years, Martin County Ambulance Service from 1998-2002, Kroger for 15 years, and WBIW for three years.
In 2017, Raines was diagnosed with Stage 3 Multiple Myeloma in 2017 and received a Bone Marrow Transplant the same year. " I could not move, bed confined and still have lesions and tumors throughout my whole body," said Raines.
In 2018 Raines launched a social media page " Southern Indiana News and Views" through that page it broke four news stories that local media was not aware of and eventually covered the breaking news.
" I had three newspapers, and television stations watching my page for breaking news. One of the newspapers went up running their news story based on the information from my page. They had enough confidence in my reporter the editor told the reporter to go ahead and run the story," Raines added
In 2019, Raines went on to WBIW as an assignment reporter covering government and other news coverage.
" I was referred to as a social media warrior but, I just went on and done my best to cover news the best I could," said Raines. " I wanted to see if I could do this, being and I am not very good at technology but thought I could launch my own news site,"
On November 24, 2021, lczephyr.org was launched, improvements are continually being made so people of all ages can use the website and find the information they would like to access.
Feedback is important by contacting braines@lczephyr.net