From Stan Bass: Right after the Feast this year, I returned to the Bahamas to attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting. As a press reporter for "The Plain Truth," I was able to sit in on press briefings with other news correspondents and personnel. I was impressed by how the complexion of the gathering has changed over the years and is to the point where gentile nations of Britain's own Commonwealth are beginning to exert considerable pressure over Britain itself. I stayed for the final communique, which reflected a compromise on what to do about South Africa.
As of October we had a 17.8 percent increase in income, including Holy Day offerings, for the region over the same period last year. This is very encouraging. So far, income for Puerto Rico, Bahamas, Bermuda, Jamaica and Dominica has already exceeded the total income these islands received for all of last year.
TV and radio responses are up 78.7 percent over the same month last year. This reflects our addition of a second television station in Trinidad and continuing good response from Aruba. Our donation mail is also running 10.8 percent above last year.
In keeping with certain adjustments being made in the newsstand program in the U.S., we are also making changes in the region. We are canceling our lighted display island in San Juan International Airport. We will, however, maintain the 800 newsstand issues which go to outlets in Cayman Islands, Dominica, Antigua, St. Thomas and St. Croix.
We have found that our PT response cards, which are placed in the "Temporarily Out of Stock" cardholders, are very effective and are showing a better response rate than the newsstand issues themselves.
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