Contributors Anna Duckworth and Sofia Acosta. John Guillemette and Elli Fotopoulou at Erector Square on Tuesday. Veteran journalists Colleen Van Tassel and Tom Smith joined 11 New Haveners at Erector Square this week to distribute 10,000 freshly printed copies of the (New) New Haven Advocate — a former alt weekly that has been reborn as an arts-and-culture quarterly. Van Tassell and Smith had long dreamed of reviving the publication they used to work for. Flipping through the 48-page broadsheet newspaper in their hands on Tuesday, they had an inside scoop: print news isn’t dead. This revival looks a bit different from its predecessor, coming out only four times a year instead of once a week. The new newspaper is the brainchild of Smith, Van Tassel, and writer and illustrator John Guillemette, who serve as the paper’s editors. The newspaper production is a spinoff of the former weekly New Haven Advocate, which ran from 1975-2013. The publication included investigative journalism, political commentary, magazine-style feature writing, and arts coverage, among other sections.  “It’s a totally new thing and it’s taking a different shape …The Advocate is new in more ways than one,” Guillemette said in a phone call Wednesday afternoon. With the Advocate’s trademark expiring in December 2013, the team is now in process of reinstating the trademark under its new name. Despite the cloudy, downcast day, the energy was high at Erector Square on Tuesday. Guillemette and metal sculptor Elli Fotopoulou welcomed couriers with food and drinks at their shared studio space at 315 Peck St., an industrial space which hosts over 200 local artists. By the end of Tuesday, 7,500 copies had been distributed, according to Guillemette. The new newspaper had been dropped off at various locations downtown as well as in Amity, Beaver Hills, East Rock, Fair Haven, Newhallville, the Hill, and Westville, among other neighborhoods. It had also made its way to all five New Haven Free Public Library branches, Tweed New Haven Airport, Sushi Palace and Three Brothers Diner in Hamden, the Bartels Student Activity Center in West Haven, and Redscroll Records in Wallingford. View the list of updated drop off locations here. Smith and Van Tassel’s relationship with the Advocate runs deep. They both previously worked as reporters at the alt weekly, with Smith working at the publication during the 1970s and 1980s and Van Tassel during the 1990s and early 2000s, publishing under the pseudonym “Miss B.” Van Tassel has been thinking about the Advocate’s revival for seven years. It wasn’t until she met Guillemette last September at Spruce Coffee that the idea finally kicked into full gear. “There was a circle of friends and former colleagues that we talked to about this, but [we were] just spitballing ideas,” Smith said. The trio would continue to have brainstorming sessions at Spruce Coffee, before holding their first larger meeting with New Haven artists and potential collaborators in March. From there, they opened up contributor submissions from mid-March to April, and had a final meeting in the summer to celebrate submission materials. “When we met John, the sky was the limit with him, you know? There were no barriers with him,” Van Tassel said with a chuckle. “And I would say, ‘I would like to do that but I don’t think we can.’ And he’s like, ‘Let’s try it!'” “His energy is this, is the New Haven Advocate,” she continued, as she stressed the multigenerational influence behind the publication. “John is going to take it into the future.” In contrast to a traditional newsroom, the (New) New Haven Advocate operates off of free, volunteer-based work. Whereas an average newsroom would have sales, production, art, editorial, and distribution departments, Van Tassel explained, “the three of us were all five of those,” recalling how they did everything from doorknocking down Chapel Street to selling ads to editorial work. “This whole thing is a community endeavor,” Guillemette said, adding that newspaper content, labor, pick up and additional drop off locations have all been crowd-sourced. Unique challenges were also tied into the print medium, with Van Tassel discussing the difficulties of finding a printer. Searching for printers four years ago led her and Smith to Trumbull Printing Co., formerly located at 205 Spring Hill Road. In 2024, the factory closed its doors, according to an article by Westfair Business Journal. The building was bought by BACO Enterprises Inc, a New York-based construction supplier this May, according to CT Mirror. These roadblocks didn’t stop the overall progress and the team pivoted, with Guillemette finding a supplier in New Hampshire. Initially, they planned to order 5,000 copies, but changed to 10,000 due to the overwhelming amount of support from businesses and community members that ran ads and supported reporting efforts. “It was that kind of response that made us believe we can dream bigger than we thought,” he said. Nestled in between the centerfold of the newspaper is Sofia Acosta’s work, kicking of the music section with her pieces “A Love Letter to Music” and “Club Cunt: An Interview with Zoe and Mar,” co-editors of Connectic*nt. Acosta’s journey to the Advocate was far from linear. A 2025 graduate from the University of Connecticut, Acosta became a staff reporter at the New London-based newspaper The Day. Then, after suddenly being laid off in March, Acosta found a new home at the Advocate. Barista by day, reporter at night, Acosta continued to explore the music beat and highlight DJ collectives in the city. “I’m just so happy to see it being cultivated,” she said of the club scene in New Haven. She also cited her background in ballet as fueling her passion for music coverage. While Acosta said that she missed having a physical newsroom to report to and meet colleagues, she noted the difference reporting for a quarterly publication, saying that she has more freedom over her coverage and can spend more time on stories compared to the fast-paced nature at daily papers. “To have this paper and know that you have three full months to consume it and to digest it, like, I think even for the reader that feels nice,” she said. She described the relationship between readers and writers as “reciprocal” and added that writers may “feel more appreciated” by viewers by having their work in a broadsheet medium. “I want people to really read the writing and think about it, and I feel like people don’t get much time to do that with daily papers.” Walking to the loading dock on Tuesday was Luis Luna, accompanied by his trusted four-legged sidekick Pinto. Growing up reading the original Advocate, Luna knew he couldn’t pass up the chance to help support and distribute the successor’s paper. “There’s something grounding about written material that reflects the community,” he said. “It’s really cool.” Videographer Josh Bibbey, recording the scene as volunteer couriers celebrate the launch of the New Haven Advocate. The shipment of two crates crates holding the 10,000 copies. A workout as Fotopoulou and others take stacks off of the pallet… …and load them into trunks. The dream courier team, with special guest appearance from the courier dog, Pinto. Cover art created by Simone Hasselmo, a child and adolescent psychiatry fellow at the Yale School of Medicine Click above to watch an interview with the Advocate editors on WNHH FM’s “Dateline New Haven” program. The post The (New) New Haven Advocate Hits The Streets appeared first on New Haven Independent. ...read more read less