SHAMOKIN - The News-Item and Tom Kutza will launch their 11th year of Letters to Santa at newsitem.com on Monday, Dec. 2.
Kutza, with his "personal" connection to Santa Claus, started Letters to Santa during his days as the voice of WISL 1480 Radio. When the station went silent in the late 1990s, Letters to Santa was silenced, too.
It was revived in 2003 through The News-Item's website and continues to be a popular local tradition.
Hundreds of children send their letters each year for Santa to read. Daily shows involving a handful of letters are read on weekdays leading up to Christmas. The names of the children whose letters will be read that day are published along with a Christmas countdown on the front page of The News-Item.
Special music and other programming is broadcast on weekends.
Letters must be emailed to santa@newsitem.com and must be received by Dec. 13.
Letters to Santa is free.