Giving Tuesday: A Particular Set of Skills

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Hey, I'm Wes Platt. I'm not a bot. I'm not a corporate media minion. I'm just a husband, father of two wonderful kiddos, owner of a quirky puggle who lives just down the road from you in Hope Valley Ridge in South Durham.

I'm a neighbor. It just so happens that I'm a neighbor with a particular set of skills.

I've been a journalist off and on since my junior high school days in Florida, when I wrote about our terrible football team (for free) and got beat up (for free). I led the University of South Florida Oracle to its Best Student Daily in the Nation award in 1990. For a decade, I worked at The St. Petersburg Times and, while there, launched a hyperlocal regional newspaper serving readers in central Pasco County - just north of Tampa.

I took a detour into a video game design career that brought me to North Carolina, where I worked on a post-apocalyptic MMORPG called Fallen Earth and then an independent project with Prologue Games (and my buddy Colin Dwan) called Knee Deep. For three decades, I've also worked on a text-based improvisational storytelling game called OtherSpace.

But I keep coming back to journalism. During the COVID 19 pandemic, I joined School Bus Fleet Magazine - a national trade publication dedicated to school transportation issues. And then, as controversy erupted much closer to home with the Durham Public Schools classified pay situation, I launched Southpoint Access as a part-time gig. A hobby. But within a few months I realized I didn't want it to stay a hobby. So, in June 2024, I took the leap and turned the hobby into a full-time public service.

Now we've got daily newsletters covering schools, local government, new developments, businesses, and neighbors like you who make South Durham feel like home. Right now, I'm primarily a newsroom of one, with assistance from freelancers like Emily Silverman, Jeff Stanford, Preston Wilson, Tricia Smars, and Idrissa A. Smith. I also benefit from tools like Alex Rosen's SeeGov, which captures government meetings for review when I can't sit in the audience for hours on end.

Ultimately, though, I envision Southpoint Access growing beyond me, into a critical local news operation that supports at least one or two other full-time journalists, a video editor, and perhaps an advertising sales representative.

That doesn't happen without funding. Subscriptions help, but I really need donations and sponsorships to accelerate this project's sustainable evolution. So this Giving Tuesday, even though our enterprise isn't nonprofit, I hope you'll consider throwing your support behind the neighborhood news I provide every day.

I've worked in metro newsrooms, built story worlds in games, edited trade journalism, but now I'm doing work that feels most urgent: showing up for my neighbors in South Durham. When you support Southpoint Access, you're not bankrolling hot takes from a website in New York. You're underwriting careful reporting and every day clarity from an independent professional journalist who works for YOU.

Not only that, but this month I'm sharing a percentage of my revenue with the Hope Valley Elementary School PTA. So, the more support you show Southpoint Access, the more funding goes to the PTA too. Subscribe, donate, or sponsor!

Thanks for considering a gift this Giving Tuesday!

Best,

Wes Platt
Neighborhood News Guy