Since I was out of town last week, I had Irina cover my shift and traded her for a shift today (Tuesday, March 2).
It was a busy Tuesday. I began with working on a story for Pete on following up on the City Council’s new orders for COVID. Yesterday, we published a pretty fact-driven breaking news story about the changes as soon as they passed. Now we want to hear from local businesses on their thoughts. I called a handful of bars, restaurants, and event centers. Most weren’t open or were in the middle of a lunch rush and asked me to call later. Due to my schedule for the rest of the day, this story will be put on hold. I did however type up a rough rough draft for the story. I also interviewed one citizen so far who I found from her comment on Facebook on the last story we did on this.
Later tonight, I will attempt to call some bars, and tomorrow morning I will attempt to call back some restaurants. After I finally get some sources to talk to, I will insert quotes into the story, edit it, and be done with that.
I also began working on a story about the City Council candidate’s finance reports. The reports were filed Friday so we are attempting to turn the story quickly. I will be looking over the report today, writing up a rough draft based on the trends I see and then deciding which donors to call. Tomorrow, I will call donors and then finish up that story.
While I didn’t get anything published today, I laid down the groundwork for the next stories I am working on. I feel good having a game plan. and lucky me, I get two shifts in the newsroom this week. I’ll be back tomorrow to, hopefully, finish up some stories. So check in there for the next updates on all my progress!