The Bradenton Times is an online newspaper founded and continuously published on the Internet from Bradenton, Florida. It is a web news and community resource site for Bradenton and Manatee County designed to supply broad coverage of information about the community as well as current local, regional, state, and national news. Podcast interviews were introduced in 2021 .
The stated philosophy of The Bradenton Times is to be a community voice by providing news of local, state, and national topics and additionally, by providing readers the opportunity to comment on news articles, submit opinions or Letter to the Editor, create their own news articles, participate in polls, and provide article-related forums directly on the site.
The newspaper was founded by and is published by Joe McClash, a former commissioner for Manatee County (from 1990-2012) and the owner of McClash Rentals, Inc. After serving in the United States Marine Corps from 1975–1979, at the age of twenty-four, he founded McClash Heating And Cooling, continuing that business from 1982–2002.
He founded The Bradenton Times, often abbreviated to TBT, in 2008 to provide a "one-stop" location published for all community information and local news.
Official participation in other community government and affairs by McClash includes chair of Manatee County Port Authority, as well as serving on the Manatee County Civic Center Authority, West Coast Inland Navigation District, Environmental Action Commission, Tourist Development Council, and the Sarasota and Manatee Metropolitan Planning Organization. He also has participated in many other organizations in the community such as, CEO Roundtable, Tampa Bay National Estuary Program, Manatee Chamber of Commerce Joint Planning Committee, ITS Program, and the Bradenton Yacht Club.
On April 24, 2017, Joe McClash announced in an article published on the site that The Bradenton Times would end daily publication and become a weekly publication online. In 2021, a mid-weekly podcast was introduced that features interviews conducted by the editor, Dennis Maley. The Bradenton Times currently publishes 3 times a week with a Sunday edition, Midweek Edition, and a Weekend Edition. All news editions are emailed to a subscriber list. There is paywall to view the site, however a voluntary subscription is encouraged .
Before joining The Bradenton Times, editor Dennis Maley was a freelance writer and regular contributor to a regional magazine, Creative Loafing. Maley also wrote a regular column for Boxing World magazine [9] and had been a featured writer in many health and fitness publications. Initially, the Maley opinion column appeared each Thursday and Sunday and tending to focus on politics, economics, regional planning, and the environment. It continues to be featured on Sundays.
During January 2022 TBT expanded local coverage with reporting by Dawn Kitterman. Dawn has proven her ability to produce fact based news articles often times investigating complex issues and presenting them in in a way readers can understand.
There is no doubt local news needs to be supported by our community to insure our democracy continues. Without news, there is no light on our govenrment. Readers and advertisers are needed to maintain and increase our local news coverage.
In August of 2023 The Bradenton Times transitioned to a new content manager for our news site to increase the value of our news product to our community.
