On Dec. 17, 2010, I published my first story with the Raleigh Public Record.
It was about the future land use proposal for an area near Jones Franklin Road, Western Boulevard and Hillsborough Street. Having only been in Raleigh for four months, I was pretty clueless. I didn’t even know where any of these streets were located, let alone anything about the 2030 Comprehensive Plan.
I’ve come a long way since then. Two years later, you can find me in my usual seat in the City Council chambers (fourth row, all the way to the left) for council meetings, budget workshops and Planning Commission meetings. When I’m not there, I’m upstairs at a council committee meeting or down the street in the courthouse for a Wake County Commission meeting, often as the sole representative of the media.
I’m writing to ask you to support the Raleigh Public Record because what we do is critical, and because I absolutely love my job. And not only do I love my job, I love the organization I work for. You have to admit, that’s almost unheard of these days. I love it so much that I serve as the staff representative on the Record’s Board of Directors, so that I can have a say in the organization’s future.
Writing for the Record isn’t something I do for fun or for extra cash. It’s how I make a living. It’s how I pay my student loans and my mortgage. My income from the Record puts food on my family’s table, which I purchase from local farmers. It pays for the coffee that I buy from a locally owned cafe downtown. And when you go to as many government meetings as I do, coffee is key.
When you make a donation to the Record, you become a job creator. You help create a job for me and the other Record reporters. I can tell you that your donation directly pays for the reporting you see on our website. It goes to us, the reporters, who without it would be unemployed.
You are a job creator and for that, I am so, so thankful. As I celebrate my two-year anniversary with the Record, I’m hoping that you will make a donation and continue supporting the Record’s excellent coverage, and by extension, its reporters and our local economy. Thanks for being job creators!
Sincerely,
Ariella Monti
amonti@raleighpublicrecord.org
