Four years ago today, we switched on the lights at the fully-formed Hell Gate.
What began as five veteran reporters with a dream for a worker-owned local newsroom has blossomed into an award-winning, 10-person team with more than $70,000 in monthly subscription revenue. We've covered a thrilling mayoral race, reported on too many City Hall indictments to count, launched a must-read daily newsletter, hosted all manner of concerts/forums/screenings/gatherings, and reviewed many, many public restrooms and $20 dinners (not at the same time).
Since 2022, we've not only kept the lights on at Hell Gate, but we are now running a veritable journalistic tanning salon, living and dying by what writer Aymann Ismail recently called the "increasingly radical belief that a publication should be fun to read."
Today's website and newsletter refresh (brought to us once again by our fellow worker-owned company Partner and Partners), shows off what we've accomplished and where we're going next. From our deep-dive investigations, which are now helpfully featured on the left side of our homepage, to Cultural Capital, our biweekly newsletter about art/music/film/theater/TV that will launch later this week.
Scroll down and you'll find another beautiful surprise—the Hell Gate Podcast is now on video. You can now join us in the Ruth Ann Harnisch studio in Lower Manhattan as we get together weekly to discuss our reporting and greater New York City. Is it a podcast? A news show? A strange beautiful new third thing that maybe we've just come up with? Yes yes and yes.
We have even more in store for you over the next few months, especially now that we have our new editor, Holly Pretsky, on board.
Not yet a subscriber? Then get on board with our 99-cent T-shirt sale. You'll get a piece of limited edition, union-made merch and support one of the most hopeful things happening in local journalism today.
Because even though we've already blown through our most modest expectations for Hell Gate, we're just getting started.