>Thoughts?
#2 is better, by far.
My main thought is to ask why the home grown CMS solution when there are some outstanding platforms that have all of this built in. My favorite,
Drupal would allow blogs AND organic groups (like for UK DhO'ers, etc) that could have their own forums and news/feeds etc all hanging off the main framework of the mother site. AND you could filter out types of posts you did not want to see in teh active list --i've been developing with this since 2003, i could go on for some time...
Talk to me if you want to learn more. I'd gladly lend a hand.