Government and politics reporting
I have covered governments from New York City to Frye Island, Maine (population, approximately 0).
See my favorite stories below.
See my favorite stories below.
‘We’re screwed’: Washington County officials face outcry over proposed 40% budget hike
MACHIAS — Washington County commissioners presented a 2026 budget that includes a 40% budget hike at a lengthy and packed public hearing Thursday at which residents lambasted officials trying to manage a fiscal crisis.
The proposed budget is due to receive edits from an advisory committee. It undergirds an $11 million bond issue up for a referendum on the Nov. 4 ballot. Overhanging the budget meeting was the possibility that voters, outraged by mismanagement and frustrated by high taxes, might reject the bond the proposed budget is meant to support.
Wilton Police using AI to generate reports with software developed by 19-year-old tech CEO
Last year, MIT dropout George Cheng began emailing police departments across the country with a sales pitch. His startup had developed new AI software that promised to save officers thousands of hours of paperwork every year.
If they would upload their body camera footage into his program, it could generate draft police reports in minutes.
In the small Franklin County town of Wilton, Police Chief Ethan Kyes was one of the first to take him up on the offer.
A remote Maine town is ready to close its 5-student school
TOPSFIELD — Jenna Stoddard is not sure where her son will spend his days when he starts preschool next fall.
Sending him to East Range II School would be convenient and continue a legacy. Stoddard lives just down the street and her husband graduated eighth grade there in 2007, one in a class of three. Topsfield’s population has dropped since then. The school now has five students, two teachers, few extracurricular activities and nobody trained to teach music, art, gym or health.
Unexpected defeat of referendums shows growing power of Ireland’s traditional Catholics
DUBLIN (RNS) — At a Mass said in Latin on Sunday (March 10), Ireland’s traditional Catholics declared political victory, days after a pair of referendums aimed at secularizing the Irish Constitution were unexpectedly and resoundingly defeated.
On Friday, the Irish government put two measures to a vote that would have extended the rights of unmarried couples in the country’s constitution and removed language defining women’s roles “within the home.” Both had been widely expected to pass...
Democrats push to lower voting age to 16 for school board races
Top New Jersey Democrats promised to push legislation lowering the voting age to 16 for school board elections statewide at a teen activist conference at Rutgers’ Newark campus on Saturday.
As book bans and the risks of school shootings have politicized high schools nationwide, dozens of young activists, many of them high school students, gathered at Saturday’s Vote 16 Youth Summit hosted by the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice.
As Astoria’s Traffic Deaths Rose, this Redditor Formed a Movement
Biking through Astoria, Queens on a late summer night, Alex Duncan burned through roughly 20 sticks of sidewalk chalk. Stopping every few blocks, he crouched by the iconic green pavement of the bike lanes and scrawled a message for his neighbors to see the next morning.
“Astoria — Demand daylighting and pedestrian safety — Tonight 7 PM.”
Seton Hall accused of contributing to flooding in local neighborhoods
Libre Jones and her husband moved to the Ivy Hill neighborhood in Newark — just steps from Seton Hall’s campus — in early 2021. While they couldn’t afford a home in South Orange, Ivy Hill offered proximity to the suburbs, a good school system, and a quiet, neighborly community.
“It really just looked like the perfect place,” Jones said.
Months later, that perfect place was overrun with floodwater from Hurricane Ida. Water began to spill into Jones’s basement through her toilet, soaking through furniture and contaminating personal items with unsanitary water. With her insurance failing to cover the $25,000 of structural damage, not to mention the irreplaceable sentimental value of lost family photos, Jones’s life was turned upside down.
A long train grinds life to a halt every day in this rural Maine town
JACKMAN — Driving down Main Street in the early afternoon last week, Steve Begin and his fellow woods crew narrowly missed their chance at a quick ride home. In the center of town, their path was blocked by a wall of freight more than a mile long, moving sluggishly.
“It can be a huge pain in the ass,” Begin said over the blaring crossing alarm. He guessed he might wait for more than half an hour.
Business reporting
I worked as a consumer-focused business reporter at The U.S. Sun, and then began freelancing as a finance and investments-focused business reporter for GlobalPETS/Pets International, a major pet industry publication.
You can see my latest for GlobalPETS here.
Analysis: US pet food industry braces for tariffs as Trump returns to Washington
With President-elect Donald Trump on his way back to the White House, industry groups are working hard to influence his controversial trade policies. Trump has said he may begin levying tariffs via executive order on the first day of his new administration, 20 January.
How avian flu cases in domestic cats can impact food manufacturing
At least 40 domestic cats in the US have been infected with avian flu since 2025 began, according to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). But with limited testing available, the true scope and causes of the outbreak remain unclear.
This has posed challenges for certain industry stakeholders, with at least some blame falling on raw cat food producers.
Coronavirus Coverage
I began my college writing career in Fall 2019. I became an editor in Spring 2020.
For interactive graphics relating to the pandemic's impact on campus, see my data page
Health Services clarifies testing protocols, while virologist calls outbreak risk ‘unacceptably high’
A Seton Hall virologist called the risk of a COVID-19 outbreak on campus “unacceptably high” after a Health Services interview with The Setonian clarified the University's testing and tracing protocols.
Health Services’ most detailed explanation of its protocols yet comes in the wake of three residents testing positive for COVID-19 this fall semester. The newly clarified testing and tracing procedures explain who can be tested by Health Services and for what reasons.
