Mainstreet Connect, the latest entrant into the hyperlocal news space, has raised a $3.97 million first round, according to an SEC filing. Last month, the Connecticut-based company launched four sites in the northeast within the past three months. This is the start of what founder Carll Tucker event hopes will be 3,000 hyperlocal news sites by 2013. Before embarking on creating a hyperlocal news empire, Tucker was editor and publisher of Trader Publications, a community news company based in Cross River, NY. He founded the company in 1981 and sold it to Gannett (NYSE: GCI) about 11 years ago. He has also held executive posts at Saturday Review magazine and a staff writer and theater critic for The Village Voice in New York City.